























THE POET ASSASSINATED 





SECOND LIEUTENANT GUILLAUME APOLLINAIRE 


The 
Poet Assassinated 


By 
GUILLAUME APOLLINAIRE 


Translated from the French with a Biographical Notice 
and Notes by 


MATTHEW JOSEPHSON 





NEw YORK 
THE BROOM PUBLISHING CO. 
1923 


Copyright, 1923, by 
THE BROOM PUBLISHING CO. 





Published December 1923 


Twelve hundred and fifty copies of this book 


were printed on Alexandra Japan vellum 
and the type distributed 


NUMBER £4 


Printed in the United States of America 


BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE 


‘There are men who cannot bring themselves to 
conform with the rest of human society, who cannot 
conceive of a secure and honorable career even at the 
hands of a tolerant age. They flee, they are eternally 
escaping from the fold by some particularly outrageous 
or suicidal action. Rimbaud having mastered the art 
of poetry in his twenties, deserted literature to lead 
caravans through the African desert. Apollinaire at al- 
most as early an age had also mastered the traditional 
forms of his art, but with Rimbaud’s example before 
him could not become “‘an explorer, a trapper, a robber, 
a hunter, a miner.” 

Possessed of great energy, curiosity, and disrespect, 
he was from the start thrown upon the side of those 
who flout authority, court disorder and embrace the 
glitter and profusion of an intensely mundane existence. 

To regard the spectacle of modern life and to sense 
the cleavage with the past and with the art or humani- 
ties of the previous day, is to be “‘modern’’. For many 
the word is hateful; and yet Apollinaire set out de- 
liberately to be modern: to revalue the contributions 

[7] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


of the past in terms of the phenomenal changes which 
the twentieth century and the Great War had brought 
in. 

The barbarous new age he courted, adopting much 
of its method, the character of its institutions and 
its cruel philosophy. Perhaps he has interpreted his 
age best in his own personality, that is to say his life, 
a large and daring conception in itself. 

“Vain to be astonished at his continual feast-mak- 
ing,’ says his friend the painter, Rouveyre, ‘‘at the 
rash exploits he undertook, at the crown of thorns 
he inflicted upon himself. . . He was a prodigious 
creator and all of his literary and social games, were of 
the most brilliant and lavish character, far more so 
than their objects. Like God, who could make man 
out of nothing, Apollinaire made many, with the same 
poverty of material.’’ (Souvenirs de mon Commerce 
—A. Rouveyre, Paris, 1919, Mercure de France.) 


Apollinaire was born in Monte Carlo in 1880. It 
is still a delicate matter to approach the facts of his 
life, to some extent, because of his confusing boasts and 
pretensions. We do know that his mother was Mme. 
de Kostrovitzka, a lady of Polish descent who lived in 
France, and that Apollinaire (i. e., Wilhelm de Kos- 
trovitzki) was baptized in Rome on September 29, 
1880. 

He received an extensive and preciose education. 

[8] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


He lived with his mother in a chateau outside of Paris, 
a huge mansion that had a billiard room, music par- 
lors, salons, and animals of all kinds: monkeys, dogs, 
snakes, parrots, canaries. Apollinaire travelled much 
when he was quite young, chiefly in Germany, Italy 
and Eastern Europe; he lived and studied in the Rhine- 
land. hen he came back to Paris, with “‘all the poems 
he had been collecting in a cigar-box.”’ 

A literary career in Paris, is perfectly conventional 
by now. Yourun after the editors of newspapers, and 
finally you are allowed to contribute “‘feuilletons’’ to 
them. [hen the magazines, the publishers, and you 
have “‘arrived.’’ Apollinaire became a journalist and | 
lived for a time by the veriest pot-boiling, some of 
which included translations of Aretino, an edition of 
the Marquis de Sade, introductions to pornographical 
classics, and even a great bibliographical work, called, 
“The Inferno of the National Library.’’ But he soon 
became notorious in Paris. He gathered a motley horde 
of writers, painters and types (i. e., idiots, or freaks), 
and paraded from the right bank to the left, from 
the Montmartre to Montparnasse. His associates are 
now the most distinguished names of France, 
Henri-Matisse, Picasso, Dérain, Braque, Rousseau (the 
old man whom he “‘discovered’’ near the fortifications 
of Paris), and André Salmon, Marie Laurencin, Max 
Jacob, Pierre Reverdy, ‘‘baron’’ Mollet, his secretary. 

He was intensely conscious of the time-spirit. An 

[9] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


original and rugged intellect, he disquieted those who 
were repelled by his lavish and heedless manner. For 
him the French literature of the Symbolist era, which 
de Gourmont still presided over, was dead, and he be- 
came, during that whole period from 1905 to the 
end of the Great War, the only living force in France. 
He predicted the sterile close of the literature of de 
Regnier and Paul Fort, “‘Prince of Poets’ (!), herald- 
ing an age of boundless expansion and experiment, 
with new zones of experience, new forms, and a yet 
more complex and rich civilization. 

Such ideas were in the air of Europe: there was 
Marinetti, in Italy; Cézanne had nearly brought his 
stupendous work to a close; and a group of painters, 
Picasso, Duchamps, Picabia, Braque, Dérain (the 
Cubists), launched their work upon a frightened 
world. ‘The abstract investigations of the Cubists 
appealed to him powerfully. Apollinaire became their 
ringleader. His book, ““The Cubist Painters,’ is an 
authoritative apology for this movement. But not 
content with this, he conceived little movements of his 
own, invented names for them, wrote up programs, 
and precipitated bad painters into careers. It was not 
all buffoonery. He may have placed silly, vacuous 
individuals at the head of the reviews he organized, 
“*Les Soirées de Paris’’, Nord Sud (named after the new 
subway); but some of the best modern writing of 
the time, by Max Jacob, Pierre Reverdy, André Sal- 

[10] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


mon, Paul Valéry, Apollinaire himself, and some ex- 
tremely youthful poets who are now Dadaists, were 
included in them. His great charm in conversation, his 
uproarious wit, his complete shamelessness, made him 
idol of all who were drawn to him. 

Alcools, his first collection of poems, appeared in 
1913. It was the escape of a personality from the 
“eternal recurrence.’’ The Symbolists had sought a 
kind of exalted, objective state; this false mysticism 
was accompanied by an attitude of fatigue, and preciose 
resignation. Even the language, in their hands had 
become crystallized, or static. Apollinaire’s attitude 
was the complete reverse. A wonderfully happy man, 
his verse was lustier and sturdier. He had learned much 
from the reawakened interest in the “‘primitive’’ Italian 
painters. ‘“[here was no false shading in his work. 
Every line was as direct as in a child’s drawing. No 
one could use clichés or write of the most common 
diurnal experiences as freshly as he. His verse had 
also a certain heroic character, an air of prophecy. 

It has always been the good fortune of France that 
Paris draws gifted strangers from other lands, who 
bring real gold to her. Apollinaire, a weird mixture 
of what Slavic and Latin strains, laid rough hands on 
the language. His aberrations are superb. He could 
never resist the foreigner’s impulse toward jeux des 
mots; and none are quicker than the French themselves 
to accept and enjoy the new puns and double-entendres. 

[11] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


For the French have gone farther, their language has 
been more pawed over and revivified through foreign 
usage than ours. Apollinaire’s exoticisms were not 
bizarre; they had the air of being conceived in con- 
versation. 

In the summer of 1914, Apollinaire was in Deau- 
ville, surrounded by a cosmopolitan horde of Poles, 
Germans, Hungarians, Czechs and Russians when 
the Great War began. He embraced the superb irony 
of these events with the utmost ardour; his attitude 
was precisely that which Pascal epitomizes: 


“Why do you wish to kill me, brother?’ 
“Do I not live on the other side of the river?” 


He went into the artillery, and was stationed at 
Nimes. He became Second Lieutenant Guillaume 
Apollinaire. “There were dull months upon months 
in the barracks. “There was also active fighting. He 
was three times wounded in the head, and trepanned. 
In the Fall of 1915, he lay in a hospital in Paris, re- 
covering from a successful operation. It was at this 
time that he assembled the fragments of a novel over 
which he had been working for a period of years, 
The Poet Assassinated. 

The poet, Croniamantal, is one of the few frankly 
epic figures of modern literature. Apollinaire had never 
really outlived the poet’s age of twenty-five, and the 
preposterous life of his hero is drawn against the artis- 

[12] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


tic and social foibles of his age. By no means mere 
satire in the 18th century sense. Apollinaire grows 
positively hilarious and intoxicated over his charac- 
ters so that at times he is beside himself with sheer fun. 
Results: humor of extraordinary eloquence and so- 
nority, and a form that is complete unrepresentative, 
with perpetual digressions and asides. 

‘There have been so many tired men in France who 
wrote like flagellants. Flaubert made his waking hours 
a nightmare; Gautier was much too corseted; to Stend- 
hal writing was a torturesome but resistless destiny; 
Villiers was a devout artisan; Mallarmé goaded himself 
into obscuracy and speechlessness. 

We must go back to Stendhal to find such extreme 
opposition to naturalism. It is enemy of all that was 
Ibsen. Distortion or under-emphasis are employed to 
fantastic ends; when a puppet is uninteresting or 
wrung dry he is dismissed or killed. Here is the de- 
_ structive side of it: Apollinaire runs all the risks, obeys 
no rules, and writes for fun. 

In the following year he was dismissed from the 
army and pronounced unfit for anything but censorship 
service. 

Discharged from the hospital, he bought himself 
the most immaculate officer’s uniform, somewhat con- 
stricting for his already corpulent form and his double 
chin, and in a victoria rode up to the editorial offices 


of the Mercure de France. His manner was perfectly 
[13 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


that of “‘a Marseillaise tenor in an opera comique. 
His friends were in an uproar over him. ‘The art life 
of Paris, flared up again, under the guns. He broke 
loose again upon his maddest tours de forces. A great 
welcoming ball was given him, an orgy attended by a 
howling, cursing, fighting throng, in which men and 
women tore about like Chaplin in the films. ‘There 
had never been such an outlandish and heterogeneous 
bazaar. Apollinaire was ravished at being the orches- 
tra-leader of such disorders and follies. “To stupify 
them he gave a production of his preposterous play, 
Les Mammelles de Ttrestas. From the point of view 
of ‘‘action,’’ of living, these were his greatest moments. 
Even before the war, these carryings on had passed 
all boundaries and were a source of scandal all over the 
world. Apollinaire was the man of the day, for this 
desperate crowd. He made poets and painters. “He 
made men and women seem much madder than they 
really were.’’ While they understood little his interior 
laughter, his rebellious imagination. 

I have stressed Apollinaire’s social adventures, 
regarding them as an aspect of his creative ex- 
pression. Wholly absorbed in art, he was completely 
wanting in the false reverence and dignity which some 
affect. Believing in the new painting of Picasso, Bra- 
que, Dérain, he could as well hold a street demonstra- 
tion, parading his friends as sandwichmen bearing 
cubist paintings. | 

a4] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


In the last days of 1918 he was stricken with in- 
fluenza and was taken off very quickly. All the fools 
and freaks stopped pirouetting. 

Calligrammes, his book of war poems had just ap- 
peared, and it is agreed that his strongest and most 
singular expressions lie in these reactions to the war. 
All other artists were involuntarily baffled by their 
moral sentiments. Only Apollinaire, with his com- 
pletely negative philosophy, his un-morality, his 
shame in all of the common virtues, could retort to 
this war with his gorgeous buffoonery and his ringing 
apostrophes. He seized the new meanings of the mod- 
ern era, from the phallic zeppelins in the sky, the labels 
on his tobacco tins, the pages of newspapers, or the 
walls of old cities. If these things are unworthy, if 
the age is damnable, then Apollinaire is damned. 

“Is there nothing new under the sun?”’ he asks. 
““Nothing—for the sun, perhaps. But for man, every- 
thing.’’ He calls upon artists to be at least as forward 
as the mechanical genius of the time. ‘The artist is to 
stop at nothing in his quest for novelty of form and 
material; to seize upon all the infinite possibilities af- 
forded by the new instruments and opportunities, 
creating thereby the myths and fables of the future. 


MATTHEW JOSEPHSON. 


[ 15 ] 




















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CONTENTS 


Page 

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE - - - - - - - 7 
TICE NOWN =) 2 Ni ee em ie a 2) 

II. PROCREATION - - - - - - - 23 
SEE PSTATION a sy 2 ee AY.29 
iV] NOBILITY), (-). -) # -' = - =~. 34 
RP RPACY (hese em Oe ey ee BB 
VI. GAMBRINUS - - - - - - - - 4] 
VII. CONFINEMENT - - - - - - - 46 
VIII. MAMMON - - - - - - - - 5i 
IX. PEDAGOGY - - - - - - - - “61 
DemeOTRY = 2 Hy age = te ee FI 
AA. DRAMATURGY ->- - - = - = 79 
Doe eRe ee ee OS 
Pete IODES «= 5 + oe ee ee OF 
MIV. ENCOUNTERS - - - -:-- - - Ill 
PEM OYAGE =~ =~) 06) © “= 4 aw om TTB 
XVI. PERSECUTION - - - - - - - 13] 
XVII. ASSASSINATION - - - - - - - 141 


peat SAPOTHEOSIS - ¢-. = 2) =i c=. = 32150 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


SECOND LIEUTENANT GUILLAUME 
APOLLINAIRE—ANDRE ROUVEYRE - Frontispiece 


WooDCUT——ANDRE DERAIN - - - = = 927 
WooDCUT—-ANDRE DERAIN = -° =)> 2 a558 
WOODCUT—ANDRE DERAIN - - - - - 9] 


WOODCUT—ANDRE DERAIN - - - - - 139 


To René Dalize 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 





THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Le 
' RENOWN 


HE glory of Croniamantal is now universal. One 
hundred and twenty-three towns in seven coun- 
tries on four continents dispute the honor of this not- 
able hero’s birth. I shall attempt, further on, to 
elucidate this important question. 
All of these people have more or less modified the 
sonorous name of Croniamantal. ‘The Arabs, the 
‘Turks and other races who read from right to left have 
never failed to pronounce it Latnamainorc, but the 
Turks call him, bizarrely enough, Pata, which signifies 
goose or genital organ. [he Russians surname him 
Viperdoc, that is, born of a fart, the reason for this 
[ 21] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 





soubriquet will be seen later on. The Scandinavians, 
or at least, the Dalecarlians, call him at will, gquoniam, 
in Latin, which means, because, but often serves to 
indicate the noble passages in popular accounts of the 
middle ages. It is to be noted that the Saxons and the 
‘Turks manifest with regard to Croniamantal, a simi- 
lar sentiment, since they refer to him by an identical 
surname, whose origin, however, is still scarcely ex- 
plained. It is believed that this is an euphemistic allu- 
sion to the fact stressed in the medical report of the 
Marseilles doctor, Ratiboul, on the death of Cronia- 
mantal. According to this official document, all the 
organs of Croniamantal were sound, and the lawyer- 
physician added in Latin, as did Napoleon’s aide Major 
Henry: partes viriles exiguitatis insignis, sicut pueti. 

For the rest, there are countries where the notion 
of the Croniamantalian virility has entirely disap- 
peared. ‘Thus, the negroes in Moriana call him Tsatsa 
or Dzadza or Rsoussour, all feminine names, for they 
have feminized Croniamantal as the Byzantines 
feminized Holy Friday in making it Saint Paras- 
cevia.' 


[ 22] 


ivf. 
PROCREATION 


WO leagues from Spa, on the road bordered by 

gnarled trees and bushes, Vierselin ‘Tigoboth, 

an ambulant musician who was coming on foot from 

Liege, struck his flint to light his pipe. A woman's 
voice cried: 

“Ho! Monsieur!”’ 

He lifted his head, and a wild laugh burst out: 
“Hahaha! Hohoho! Hihihi! thine eyelids are the 
color of Egyptian lentils!) My name is Macarée. | I 
want a tom-cat.”’ 

Vierselin Tigoboth perceived by the roadside a 
young woman, brunette and formed of nice curves. 
How charming she seemed in her short bicyclist’s skirt! 
And holding her bicycle with one hand, while gather- 
ing sloes with the other, she ardently fixed her great 
golden eyes on the Flemish musician. 

“Vs'estez one belle bacelle,’’ said Vierselin Tigo- 
both, smacking his tongue. ‘“‘But, my God, if you 

[ 23 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


eat all those sloes, you will have the colic tonight, 
[’m sure.” 

“I want a tom-cat,’’ repeated Macarée and un- 
clasping her bodice she showed Vierselin Tigoboth 
her breasts, sweet as the buttocks of the angels, and 
whose aureole was the tender color of the rose clouds 
of sunset. | 

“Oh! oh!” cried Vierselin Tigoboth, “As pretty 
as the pearls of Amblevia, give them to me. I shall 
gather a big bouquet of ferns for you and of irises, 
color of the moon.” 

Vierselin ‘Tigoboth approached to seize this mirac- 
ulous flesh which was being offered to him for nothing, 
like the holy bread at Mass; but then he restrained 
himself. 

“You're a sweet lass, by God, you're nicer than 
the fair of Liege. You're a nicer little girl than 
Donnaye, than Tatenne, than Victoire, whose gallant 
I have been, and nicer than Rénier’s daughters, whom 
old Rénier always has for sale. Mind you, if you want 
to be my love, ‘ware o’ the crablouse, by God.”’ 


MACAREE 
They are the color of the moon 
And round as the wheel of Fortune. 
VIERSELIN TIGOBOTH 
If you fear not to catch the louse 
Then I should love to be your spouse. 
[ 24 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


And Vierselin Tigoboth approached, his lips full 
of kisses: “‘Ilove you! Itis pooh! O beloved!” 

Soon there were nothing but sighs, the songs of 
birds and of russet and horned little hares, like elves, 
fleet as the seven-league boots, passing by Vierselin 
Tigoboth and Macarée, prone under the power of 
love behind the plumtrees. 

Then Macarée was off on the old contraption. 

And sad unto death, Vierselin ‘Tigoboth cursed 
the instrument of velocity which rolled away and 
vanished behind the terraced rotunda, at the same 
moment that the musician began to make water while 
humining a jingle. 


£25) 








[ 27] 






ie ee ee 
erat oF 





III. 
GESTATION 


ACAREE soon became aware that she had con- 
ceived by Vierselin Tigoboth. 

“How annoying!’ she thought at first, “But 
medicine has made much progress lately. I shall get 
rid of it when I want. Ah! that Walloon! He will 
have toiled in vain. Can Macarée bring up the son 
of a vagabond? No, no, I condemn this embryo to 
death. I should never even preserve this foetus in 
alcohol. And thou, my belly, if thou knewest how 
much I love thee since knowing thy goodness. What, 
wouldst stoop to carry such baggage as thou findest 
along the road? O too innocent belly, thou art un- 
worthy of my selfish soul. 

“What shall I say, o belly? thou’rt cruel, thou 
partest children from their parents. No! I love thee 
no longer. “Thou’rt naught but a full bag, at this 
moment, o my belly, smiling at the nombril, o elastic 

[29 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


belly, downy, polished, convex, sorrowful, round, 
silky, which ennobles me. For thou makest noble, o 
my belly, more beautiful than the sunlight. “Thou 
shalt ennoble also the child of the Flemish vagabond | 
and thou art worthy of the loins of Jupiter. What 
a misfortune! a moment ago I was about to destroy 
a child of noble race, my child who already lives in 
my beloved belly.”’ 

She opened the door suddenly and cried: 

“Madame Dehan! Mademoiselle Baba!’’ 

There was a rattling of doors and bolts and then 
the proprietors of Macarée’s lodging came running out. 

“T am pregnant,’ cried Macarée, “I am pregnant!”’ 

She was sitting up in bed, her legs spread apart. 
Her skin looked very delicate. Macarée was narrow at 
the waist and broad-hipped. 

“Poor little one,’’ said Madame Dehan, who had 
but one eye, no waistline, a moustache, and limped. 
“After confinement women are just like crushed snail- 
shells. After confinement women are simply prey to 
disease (look at me!) an egg-shell full of all sorts of 
rubbish, incantations and other witch-spells. Ah! Ah! 
You have done very well.”’ 

““All foolishness,’’ said Macarée. ““The duty of 
women is to have children, and I am sure that their 
health is generally improved thereby, both physically 
and morally.” 

““Where are you sick?’’ asked Mademoiselle Baba. 

[ 30 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“Shut up! I say,’’ exclaimed Madame Dehan. 
“Better go and look for my flask of Spa elixir and 
bring some little glasses.”’ 

Mademoiselle Baba brought the elixir. They 
drank of it. 

“I feel better now,’’ said Madame Dehan, ‘‘After 
so much emotion, I[ need to refresh myself.”’ 

She poured out another little glass of the elixir for 
herself, drank it and licked the last few drops up with 


her tongue. 
“Think of it,’’ she said finally, “think of it, 
Madame Macarée . . . I swear by all that I hold 


sacred, Mademoiselle Baba can be my witness, this is 
the first time that such a thing has happened to one 
of my tenants. And how many I have had! My 
Lord! Louise Bernier, whom they nicknamed Wrinkle, 
because she was so skinny; Marcelle la Carabiniére (the 
freshest thing you ever saw!) ; Josuette, who died of a 
sunstroke in Christiania, the sun wishing thus to have 
his revenge of Joshua; Lili de Mercoeur, a grand name, 
mind you, (not hers of course) and then vile enough 
for a chic woman, as Mercoeur put it: “You must 
pronounce it Mercure,’ screwing up her mouth like a 
chicken’s hole. Well she got hers, all right, they filled 
her as full of mercury as a thermometer. She would 
ask mein the morning: “What sort of weather do you 
think we'll have today?’ But I would always answer: 
‘You ought to know better thanI . . . Never, 
[ 31] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


never in the world would any of those have become 
enceinte in my house.” 

“Oh well, it isn’t as bad as that,’’ said Macarée, 
“TI also never had it happen to me before. Give me 
some advice, but make it short.’ 

At this moment she arose. 

“Oh!”’ cried Madame Dehan, ‘‘what a wellshaped 
behind you have! how sweet! how white! what em- 
bonpoint! Baba, Madame Macarée is going to put on 
her dressing-gown. Serve coffee and bring the bilberry 
tarh < 

Macarée put on a chemise and then a dressing gown 
whose belt was made of a Scotch shawl. 

Mademoiselle Baba came back; she brought a big 
platter with cups, a coffee pot, milk-pitcher, jar of 
honey, butter cakes and the bilberry tart. 

“If you want some good advice,’’ said Madame 
Dehan, wiping away with the back of her hand the 
coffee that dribbled down her chin, ““You had better 
go and baptize your child.” 

“T shall make sure and do that,’’ said Macarée. 

‘“‘And I even think,’’ said Mademoiselle Baba, “‘that 
it would be best to do it on the day he is born.”’ 

“In fact,’”’ Madam Dehan mumbled, her mouth 
full of food, “you can never tell what may happen. 
Then you will nurse him yourself, and if I were you, 
if I had money like you, I should try to go to Rome 
before the confinement and get the Pope to bless me. 

[ 32 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Your child will never know either the paternal caress 
or blow, he will never utter the sweet name of papa. 
May the blessing of the Holy Papa at least follow him 
all his life.’’ 

And Madame Dehan began to sob like a kettle 
boiling over, while Macarée burst into tears as abund- 
ant as a spouting whale. But what of Mademoiselle 
Baba? Her lips blue with berries, she wept so hard 
that from her throat the sobs flooded down to her 
hymen and nearly choked her. 


[331 


IV. 
NOBILITY 


FTER having won a great deal of money at 
baccarat, and already rich, thanks to Love, 

Macarée, whose corpulency nothing could conceal, 
came to Paris, where above all, she ran after the most 
fashionable modistes. 

How chic she was, how chic she was! 

* x x 

One night when she went to the Théatre Francais 
a play with a moral was presented. In the first act, 
a young woman whom surgery had rendered sterile 
lamented the fatness of her husband who had the 
dropsy and was very jealous. [he doctor went out 
saying: 

“Only a great miracle and great devotion can save 
your husband.” 

In the second act, the young woman said to the 
young doctor: 

[ 34 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“Tl offer myself up for my husband. I want to 
become dropsical in his stead.”’ 

“Let us love each other, Madame. And if you are 
not unfaithful to the principle of maternity your wish 
will be granted. And what sweet glory I shall have 
thereof!’’ 

“Alas!’’ murmured the lady, “I no longer have 
any ovaries.” 

“Love,’’ cried the doctor at this, “Love, madame, 
is capable of working the greatest miracles.” 

In the third act, the husband, thin as an I, and the 
lady, eight months gone, felicitated each other on the 
exchange they had made. The doctor communicated 
to the Academy of Medicine the results of his experi- 
ments in the fecundation of women become sterile as 
a result of surgical operations. 


*K K *K 


Toward the end of the third act, someone shouted 
“Fire!’’ in the hall. The frightened spectators rushed 
from the hall howling. In fleeing, Macarée possessed 
herself of the arm of the first man she encountered. 
He was well dressed and fair of feature, and as Macarée 
was charming, he seemed flattered that she had chosen 
him as her protector. “They made each other’s acquaint- 
ance at a café and from there went to sup in the Mont- 
martre. But it appeared that Francois des Ygrées had 
negligently forgotten to take his purse with him. 
[ 35 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Macarée gladly paid the bill. And Francois des Y grées 
pushed gallantry so far as not to allow Macarée to 
spend the night alone, the incident at the theatre having 
rendered her nervous. 


2K *K *K 


Francois, baron des Ygrées (a doubtful baronetcy 
belonging to whoever claimed it) called himself the 
last offshoot of a noble house of Provence and pursued 
a career in heraldry on the sixth floor of an apartment 
in the rue Charles V. 

“But,” he said, “‘the revolutions and the dema- 
gogues have changed things so that arms are no longer 
studied except by ill-born archaeologists, and the 
nobility is no longer tutored in this art.”’ 

The baron des Ygrées, whose coat of arms was of 
azur a trots patrles d’argent posés en pal, was able to 
inspire enough sympathy in Macarée for her to want 
to take lessons in heraldry out of gratitude for that 
night at the Théatre Francais. 

Macarée showed herself, it is true, little given to 
learning the terminology of heraldry, and one might 
even say that she did not interest herself seriously in 
anything but the arms of the Pignatelli who had fur- 
nished popes for the Church and whose coat-of-arms 
was adorned with kettles. 

However, these lessons were wasted time to neither 
Macarée nor Francois des Yegrées, for they ended by 

[ 36 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


marrying. Macarée brought as her dot, her money, her 
beauty and her fatness. Francois des Y grees offered to 
Macarée a great name and his noble bearing. 

Neither complained of the bargain and they found 
themselves very happy. 

““Macarée, my dear wife,’’ said Francois des Y grées 
a few days after their marriage, ‘‘Why have you ordered 
so many robes? It seems to me that hardly a day passes 
without some modiste brings new costumes. They do, 
true enough, honor to your taste and to their skill.” 

Macarée hesitated for a moment and then replied: 

“Tt is to our honeymoon that you refer, Francois!”’ 

“Our honeymoon, yes, I have thought of it. But 
where do you want to go?”’ 

“To Rome,’’ said Macarée. 

“To Rome, like the bells of Easter?’’ 

“IT want to see the Pope,’’ said Macarée. 

“Very fine, but what for?’’ 

“That he may bless the child who lies under my 
heart,’’ said Macareée. | 

“Phew-ew-ew!”’ 

“It will be your son,’’ said Macarée. 

“You are quite right, Macarée. We shall go to 
Rome like the bells of Easter. You will order a new 
robe of black velvet; and the dressmaker must not 
neglect to embroider our arms at the bottom of the 
skirt: of azur d trots pairles d’argent posés en pal.” 


[ 37] 


V. 
PAPAGG 


R carita, baroness, (I had almost called you 

Mademoiselle!) Ah! Ah! Ah! But the baron, 
your husband, he would protest. Ah! ah! quite true, 
you have a little belly which commences to become 
arrogant. “They do their work well, I see, in France. 
Ah! if that fine country would only become religious 
again, the population decimated by anti-clericalism 
would at once, (yes, baroness) the population would 
increase considerably. Ah! dear Christ! how well she 
listens, the arrogantine, when one talks seriously, yes, 
baroness, you have the air of an arrogantine. Ah! ah! 
ah! so, you want to see the Pope. Ah! ah! ah! the 
benediction of a mere cardinal like me will not do. 
Ah! ah! tut-tut, I understand quite well. Ah! ah! I 
shall try to obtain an audience for you. Oh! no need 
to thank me, you can let my hand go. How well she 
kisses, the arrogantine, oh! Come here, again, I want 

[ 38 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


you to carry away with you a little souvenir of me. 
“There! a chain, with the medal of the holy house 
of Lorette. Let me put it about your neck. 
Now that you have the medal you must promise me 
never to part with it. here, there, there! Come here 
so that I can kiss you on the forehead. Come, come, 
can she be afraid of me, the little arrogantine? Done! 
Now tell me why you laugh? . . Nothing! Well! 
Now, one bit of advice! When you go to the Vatican, 
I warn you not to use so much odour, I mean so much 
perfume. Goodbye, arrogantine. Come and see me 
again. My compliments to the baron.” 


*K *K *K 


It was thus, that, thanks to Cardinal Ricottino, 
who had been to Paris as nuncio, Macarée obtained an 
audience with the Pope. 

She went to the Vatican dressed in her beautiful 
armorial robe. The baron des Ygrées, in full dress, 
accompanied her. He admired much the bearing of the 
royal guards, and the Swiss mercenaries, inclined to 
drunkenness and brawling, seemed fine devils to him. 
He found occasion to whisper into his wife’s ear some- 
thing about one of his ancestors who was a cardinal 
under Louis XIII. 


*K *K *K 


The couple returned to the hotel deeply moved and 
almost prostrated by the benediction of the Pope. ‘They 
[ 39 ] 


IT'HE POET ASSASSINATED 


undressed chastely, and in bed, they spoke for a long 
time about the pontiff, the whitened head of the old 
church, a pressed lily, the snow which Catholics think 
eternal. 

“My dear wife,’ said Francois des Y grées finally, 
“‘T esteem you to adoration, and I love the child whom 
the Pope has blessed with all my heart. May he come, 
the blessed infant, but I want him to be born in 
France.”’ 

‘Francois,’ said Macarée, ‘I have never yet been 
to Monte-Carlo. Let us go there! I needn’t lose our 
whole pile. We are not millionaires, but I am sure 
that we shall be lucky in Monte-Carlo.”’ 

“Damn! damn! damn!’’ swore Francois, ‘“‘Macarée, 
you make me see red.”’ | 

“Ho, there,’”’ cried Macarée, “‘you gave me a kick, 
you— —”’ 

“T note with pleasure, Macarée,’’ said Francois des 
Yegrées waggishly, recovering his good humor, “‘that 
you do not forget that Iam your husband.” 

“Come, then, li'l nobs, let’s go to Monaco.”’ 

“Yes, but you must have your confinement in 
France, for Monaco is an independent state.”’ 

““Agreed,’’ said Macareée. 

On the morrow the baron des Ygrées and the 
baroness, all swollen by mosquito bites, took tickets 
at the station for Monaco. In the coach they laid 
charming plans. 

[ 40 ] 


VL. 
GAMBRINUS 


HE baron and the baroness des Ygrées in taking 
tickets for Monaco had thought to arrive at the 
station which is the fifth on the way from Italy to 
France and the second in the little principality of 
Monaco. 

The name of Monaco is properly the Italian name 
of this principality, although it is widely used now- 
adays in French, the French terms Mourgues and 
Monéghe having fallen into desuetude. 

However the Italians call Monaco, not only the 
principality which bears that name but also the capital 
of Bavaria which the French call Munich. The mes- 
senger accordingly gave the baron tickets for Monaco- . 
Munich instead of Monaco-principality. Before the 
baron and the baroness had noticed their error they 
were already at the Swiss frontier, and after having 
recovered from their astonishment, they decided to 

[41] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


finish the voyage to Munich in order to see at close 
hand all that the anti-artistic spirit of modern Germany 
could conceive of ugliness in architecture, sculpture, 
painting and the decorative arts. 

x * x 

The cold winds of March made the couple shiver 
in this stone-box Athens. 

‘Beer,’ the baron des Ygrées had said, “‘is excellent 
for women who are enceinte.”’ 

And so he led his wife to the royal brewery of 
Pschorr, to the Augustinerbrau, to the Miinchnerkindl 
and other great breweries. “They penetrated to the 
Nockerberg where there is a great garden. hey drank 
there, as long as it held out, the famous March beer, 
Salvator, and it didn’t last very long, for the Munich 
people are great drunkards. 

* * * 

When the baron and his wife entered the garden 
they found it thronged with a mob of drinkers, who 
were already under-the-weather and sang head to head 
and danced dizzily, breaking all the empty steins. 

Peddlers sold roast fowl, grilled herrings, pretzels, 
rolls, sausages, sweets, souvenirs, post-cards. And there 
was also Hans Irlbeck, the King of Drinkers. Since 
Perkeo, the midget drunkard of the great cask of 
Heidelberg, no such boozer had ever been seen. At the 
time of the March beer, and in May, Bock-time, Hans 


Irlbeck drank his forty quarts of beer a day. Ordi- 
[42] | 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


narily he did not have occasion to drink more than 
twenty-five. 

Just as the gracious Ygrées pair passed by, Hans 
placed his colossal buttocks on a bench which, bearing 
already the weight of some twenty huge men and 
women, cracked disconsolately. ‘The drinkers fell, their 
legs in the air. Some bare thighs could be seen because 
Munich ladies never wear their stockings above their 
knees. Bursts of laughter everywhere. Hans Irlbeck 
who had also been floored, but had not let go of his 
stein, spilled its contents over the belly of a girl who 
had rolled near him, and the beer bubbling under her 
resembled that which she did when she got to her feet 
after swallowing a quart at one gulp in order to re- 
cover her composure. 

But the proprietor of the garden cried: 

“Donnerkeil! damned swine . . . a bench 
broken.”’ 

And he started off with his towel under his arm, 
calling loudly for the waiters: 

“Franz! Jacob! Ludwig! Martin!’’ while the 
patrons called for the proprietor: 

“Ober! Ober!’’ 

However the Oberkellner and the waiters did not 
come back. ‘The drinkers crowded about the counters 
and took their steins themselves, but the kegs were no 
longer emptied, and no more were heard the sonorous 
blows of another cask being put under the hammer. 

[43 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


The singing ceased, the drinkers, angered, proffered 
oaths at the brewers and at the March beer itself. Some 
profited by the lull to vomit with violent efforts, their 
eyes almost popping out of their heads; their neighbors 
encouraged them with imperturbable seriousness. Hans 
Irlbeck who had picked himself up, not without difh- 
culty, grumbled with a great snort: 

“There is no more beer in Munich!”’ 

And he repeated, with the accent of his native city: 

““Minchen! Minchen! Minchen!’’ 

After raising his eyes toward heaven, he fell upon 
a vendor of fowls, and having ordered him to roast 
a goose for him, began to formulate his desires: 

“No more beerin Munich . . ._ if there were 
only some white radishes!”’ 

And he repeated many times the Munich expres- 
sion: 

“Raadi, raadicraadi 4 

Suddenly he stopped. ae browse of drinkers, be- 
side themselves, gave a cry of exultation. The four 
waiters had just appeared at the door of the brewery. 
With dignity they were carrying a sort of canopy under 
which the Oberkellner marched proud and erect, like 
a negro king dethroned. Behind him came fresh kegs 
of beer which were put under the hammer at the sound 
of the bell, while shouts of laughter rang out, and 
cries and songs rose above this teeming butte, hard 
and agitated as the Adam’s apple of Gambrinus him- 

[ 44] 


9? 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


self, when, burlesqued in the costume of a monk, a 
white radish in one hand, he tossed off with the other 
the jug which rejoiced his gullet. 

And the unborn child found himself right shaken 
by the laughter of Macarée who, greatly amused by the 
spectacle of this colossal gluttony, drank and drank in 
company with her spouse. 

But then, the vivacity of the mother exerted a 
happy influence on the character of the offspring who 
acquired therefrom much common sense, before his 
birth, and some of the real common sense, of course, 
which great poets are made of. 


[45 ] 


Vib 
CONFINEMENT 


ARON FRANCOIS DES YGREES left Munich 
when the baroness knew that the hour of de- 
livery was approaching. Monsieur des Ygrées did not 
want to have a child born in Bavaria; he was sure that 
that country was overrun with syphilis. 
They arrived in the springtime, in the little port 
of Napoule, which in an excellently turned verse the 
baron baptised for eternity: 


Napoule of the golden skies. 


It was there that the delivery of Macarée’s child 
took place. 
* * x 


“Ah! Ah! Aie! Aie! Aie! Ouh! Ouh! Whee-ee-ee!”’ 
The three local midwives took to improvising 
pleasantly: 
[ 46 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


FIRST MIDWIFE 

I dream of war. 

O my friends, the stars, the bright stars, have you 
ever counted them? 

O my friends, do you even remember the titles of 
all the books you have read and the names of their 
authors? 

O my friends, have you ever thought of the poor 
men who tread the broad highways? 

The herdsmen of the golden age led their herds to 
pasture without fear that the cattle would flee, they 
feared only the jungle beasts. 


O my friends, what do you think of all these 
cannons? 


SECOND MIDWIFE 


What do I think of these cannons? They are vigor- 
ous phalli. 


O my beautiful nights! I am happy because of a 
sinister horn which enchanted me last night, tis a good 
augury. My hair is perfumed with abelmosch. 

O! the beautiful and rigid phalli that these cannons 
are! If women had to do military service they would 
all go into the artillery. The sight of the cannons in 
battle would be strange for them. 

Lights are born on the sea far off. 

Reply, o Zelotide, reply with thy sweet voice. 

[ 47] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


THIRD MIDWIFE 


I love his eyes at night, he knows my hair well and 
its odour. In the streets of Marseilles an officer pursued 
me for a long time. He was well dressed and of fair 
colour, there was gold on his costume and his mouth 
tempted me, but I fled his kisses and took refuge in my 
““bedroom’’ of the ‘“‘family-house’’ where I was 


stopping. * 


FIRST MIDWIFE 


O Zelotide, spare the sad men as thou sparest this 
beau. Zelotide what thinkest thou of the cannons. 


SECOND MIDWIFE 
Alas! Alas! I want to be loved. 


THIRD MIDWIFE 


They are the tools of the ignoble love of the people. — 
O Sodom! Sodom. O sterile love! 


FIRST MIDWIFE 


But we are women, why dost thou speak of 
Sodom? 


THIRD MIDWIFE 


‘The fire of heaven devoured her. 
[ 48 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


THE CONFINED 
When you have finished your monkey-tricks, if it 
please you, will you not forget to give a little attention 
to the baroness des Y grées. 


*K *K *K 


The baron slept in a corner of the room on several 
travelling blankets. He made a fart which caused 
his better half to laugh until the tears came. Macareée 
wept, cried, laughed and a few moments later brought 
into the world a sturdy child of the male sex. ‘hen, 
exhausted by these efforts, she rendered up her soul, 
with a scream that was like the ululation of the eternal 
first wife of Adam, when she crossed the Red Sea. 

In reporting the above, I believe that I have eluci- 
dated the important question of the birthplace of 
Croniamantal. Let the 123 towns in 7 countries dis- 
pute the honor of his birth.* 

We know now, and the state records bear testi- 
mony that he was born of the paternal fart at Napoule 
of the golden skies, on the 25th of August, 1889, but 
not announced at the mayoralty until the following 
morning. ° 

It was the year of the Universal Exposition, and 
the Eiffel Tower, which was just born, saluted the 
~ * Among these towns we may cite, Naples, Adrianople, 
Constantinople, Neauphle le-Chateau, Grenoble, Pultawa, Pouil- 
ly-en-Auxois, Pouilly-les-Fours, Nauplie, Seoul, Melbourne, 


Oran, Nazareth, Ermenonville, Nogent-sur-Marne, etc. 
p494 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


heroic birth of Croniamantal with a beautiful erection. 

The baron des Ygrées made another fart which 
woke him by the macabre bed where the corpse of 
Macarée reclined. “The child cried, the midwives 
croaked, the father sobbed, and declaimed: 

“Ah, Napoule with the golden skies, I have killed 
my hen with the golden eyes!”’ 

Then he bathed the new-born calling him by a 
name which he invented forthwith and which did not 
belong to any saint in Paradise: CRONIAMANTAL. 
He left on the following day, having arranged for the 
funeral of his spouse, written the necessary letters 
assuring his inheritance, and announced the child under 
the names of Gaétan—Francis—Etienne—Jack— 
Ameélie—Alonso des Ygrées. And with this nursling 
whose putative father he was, he took the train for 
the Principality of Monaco. 4 


[50] 


VIIl. 
MAMMON 


WIDOWER, Francois des Y grées established him- 
self near the principality; on the grounds of 
Roquebrune; he took pension with a family, which 
included a pretty brunette called Mia. “There he reared 
the bearer of his own name with the baby-bottle. 
Often he would go out at dawn for a walk at the 
sea shore. The road was fringed with amaryllis which 
he would always compare involuntarily with packages 
_ of dried cod. Sometimes, because of the contrary winds, 
he would turn to light an Egyptian cigarette whose 
smoke rose in spirals like the bluish mountains emerg- 
ing far off in Italy. 
* x * 


The family in whose bosom he had installed him- 
self was composed of the father, the mother and Mia. 
M. Cecchi, a Corsican, was a croupier at the casino. 
He had previously been croupier at Baden-Baden and 
had married a German woman there. Of this union 

[51] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Mia was born; her carnation tint and black hair be- 
spoke her Corsican blood. She was always dressed in 
buoyant colors. Her walk was balanced, her figure 
arched; she was smaller at the breast than at the but- 
tocks, and a touch of strabism lent her dark eyes a 
somewhat distraught look, which only rendered her 
more tempting. 

Her speech was lazy, soft, guttural, but pleasant 
nevertheless. It was the accent of the Monegascans 
whose syntax Mia followed. After having seen the 
young girl gather roses, Francois des Ygrées began to 
take notice of her and was much amused by her syntax 
for whose rules he enjoyed making research. . . First 
of all, he noticed the italianisms in her vocabulary, and 
especially the habit of conjugating the verb “‘to be”’ 
with the wrong auxiliary. For example, Mia would 
say: ‘Je suts étée,”’ instead of “‘J’at été.’ He also 
noted her bizarre way of repeating the verb’in her 
principal clause: ‘‘I was at the Moulins, while you 
went to Menton, I was;”’ or better: ‘This year I am 
going to the gingerbread fair at Nice, I am.” 

One time before sunrise, Francois des Ygrées went 
down to the garden. He abandoned himself to sweet 
reveries, during which he caught cold. All of a sudden 
he began to sneeze about twenty times in succession. 

Sneezing aroused him. He saw that the sky had 
whitened and the horizon cleared with the first light 
of dawn. ‘Then the first shafts of sunlight enflamed 

[52] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


the sky along the Italian coast. Before him spread 
the still sorrowful sea, and on the horizon, like little 
clouds above the film of sea, could be seen the curving 
peaks of Corsica, which always disappeared after the 
rising of the sun. The baron des Ygrées shivered, then 
he yawned and stretched himself. He kept on regard- 
ing the sea to the east where one might have said there 
glittered a royal navy in sight of a seaport with white 
houses, Bodighére, which furnished palms for the fes- 
tivities of the Vatican. He turned toward the im- 
mobile guardian of the garden, a great cypress, begirt 
with a full-blown rose bush which clambered up almost 
to its top. Francois des Ygrées breathed of the sump- 
tuous roses of nonpareil fragrance whose petals, as yet 
closed, were of flesh. 

And just then Mia called him to have his breakfast. 

With her braid hanging down her back, she had 
just come to pick some figs and she was letting a few 
creamy drops flow into a pitcher of milk. She smiled 
at Francois des Ygrées, saying: 

‘Have you slept well?”’ 

“No, there are too many mosquitoes. ’”’ 

“Don’t you know that when you are stung you 
should rub the place with lemon and in order not to 
be stung by them you should put vaseline on your 
face before going to sleep. “They never bite me.”’ 

“That would be too bad. For you are very pretty, 
and ought to be told so oftener.”’ 
[ 53 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


‘There are those who tell me so and others who 
think so without telling. “Those who tell it to me 
make me neither hot nor cold, as for the others, so 
much the worse for them. i 

And Francois des Ygrées conceived at once a little 
fable for the timid: 

FABLE OF THE OYSTER AND THE HERRING 

An oyster dwelt, beautiful and wise, on a rock. She 
never dreamed of love but during fine weather simply 
bayed beatifically at the sun. A herring saw her and 
it was as a spark of powder. He tumbled hopelessly 
in love with her without daring to avow it. 

One summer day, happy and coy, the oyster 
yawned. Smuggled behind a rock the herring looked 
on, but all at once the desire to imprint a kiss upon 
his beloved became so overpowering that he could no 
longer restrain himself. 

And so he threw himself between the open shells 

of the oyster who in her surprise shut them with a 
snap, decapitating the wretched herring, whose head- 
less body floats aimlessly upon the ocean. 
"Twas so much the worse for the herring,’’ said 
Mia laughing, ‘“‘He was much too foolish. I too want 
people to tell me that I am pretty, not for fun, but so 
as we can marry. . 

And Francois des Ygrées noted for future consider- 
ation her curious peculiarities of syntax: “‘so as we can 

[54] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


marry. .. . And he thought further: ‘‘She doesn’t 
love me. Macarée dead. Mia indifferent. Alas I am 
unhappy in love.”’ 

* * * 

One day he found himself in the valley of Gau- 
mates on a little knoll covered with skinny little pines. 
The shore trimmed by the white-blue of the waves 
stretched far out before him. “The Casino emerged 
from the bank of splendid trees in its gardens. “This 
palace looked like a man squatting and lifting his arms 
toward heaven. Near it, Francois des Y grées hearkened 
to an invisible Mammon: 

“Regard this palace, Francois, it is made in the 
image of man. It is sociable like him. It loves those 
who come to it and especially, those who are unhappy 
in love. Go there and thou wilt win, for thou canst 
not lose in play, since thou hast lost all in love.” 

Since it was six o'clock, the angelus tinkled from 
the different churches in the neighborhood. ‘The voice 
of the bells prevailed against the voice of the invisible 
Mammon, who became silent, while Francois des 
Ygrées searched for him. 

* * * 

On the next day, Francois took the road to the 
temple of Mammon. It was Palm Sunday. The 
streets were littered with children, young girls and 
women carrying palms and olive-branches. “The palms 
were either very simple or woven in a peculiar fashion. 

[55] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


At each corner of the street, the weavers of palms were 
sitting against the wall, working. Under their deft 
hands the palm fibers bent, circled bizarrely and charm- 
ingly. ‘he children were playing about already with 
hard eggs. Ona square a troop of urchins were pum- 
melling a red-headed kid whom they had found trying 
to consume a marble egg. Very small girls were going 
to mass, well dressed and carrying like candles the 
woven palms in which their mothers had hung sweet- 
meats. , 

Francois des Y grées thought: 

“The sight of these palms brings good luck and 
today, which is gay Easter, I shall break the bank.”’ 


*K *K >K 


In the game hall, he regarded at first the diverse 
throng which pressed about the tables. . . 

Francois des Ygrées approached a table and played. 
He lost. The invisible Mammon had come back and 
spoke sharply each time they erased a deal: 

‘Thou hast lost!”’ | 

And Francois saw the crowd no more, his head was 
turning, he placed louis, packages of bills, on one 
square, diagonally, transversally. He played a long 
time losing as much as he wanted to. 

He turned away at last and saw the whole brilliant 
hall where the players still pressed about the tables 
as before. Noticing a young man whose chagrined 

[ 56 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


face revealed that he had had no luck, Francois smiled 
at him and asked whether he had lost. 

‘The young man replied angrily: 

“You too? A Russian just won more than two 
hundred thousand francs by my side. Ah! if I only 
had a hundred francs more, I would make up 
what I have lost twenty or thirty times over. But 
Oh, I have beastly luck, I am hoodooed, done for. 
Imagine. 

And taking Peter by the arm, he led him toward 
a divan on which they sat down. 

“‘Imagine,’’ he continued, “‘I have lost everything. 
I am almost a thief. The money I have lost did not 
belong to me. [am not rich, I had a position of trust. 
My employer sent me to recover claims in Marseilles. 
I got them. I took the train to come here and try my 
luck. I lost. What is there left? “They will arrest 
me. They will say that I am a dishonest man, even 
though I haven't ever profited of the money I took. 
I have lost all. If I had won, no one would have re- 
proached me. What luck I have! ‘There is nothing 
for me to do but to kill myself.’’ 

And suddenly rising the young man put a revolver 
to his mouth and fired. “The corpse was carried away. 
Several players turned their heads a moment, but none 
of them bothered at all, and most of them took no 
notice of the incident which, however, made a profound 
impression on the mind of the baron des Ygrées. He 

[57] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


had lost all that Macarée had left him and the child. 
As he went out Francois felt the whole universe con- 
tract about him like a tiny cell, and then like a coffin. 
He got back to the villa where he lived. At the door 
he passed Mia who was chatting with a stranger who 
carried a valise. 

“T am a Hollander,’’ said the man, “‘but I live in 
Provence and I would like to hire a room for several 
days; I have come here to make some mathematical 
observations.” 

At this moment the baron des Ygrées sent a kiss 
with his left hand to Mia, while with a revolver in his 
right he blew his brains out and rolled in the dust. 

““We have only one room to rent,’’ said Mia, “‘but 
it- has just become free.’’ 

And she quickly closed the eyelids of the baron des 
Yegrées, gave cries of grief, and aroused the neighbor- 
hood. 


2 * * 


As to the young child, whom his father had in 
such a characteristic burst of lyricism named for aye 
Croniamantal, he was gathered up by the Dutch 
traveller who soon carried him off to bring him up 
as his own son. 

On the day they left, Mia sold her virginity to a 
millionaire trap-shooting-champion, and it was the 
thirty-fifth time that she had lent herself to this little 


commercial transaction. 
[ 58 ] 








TX 
PEDAGOGY 


HE Dutchman, named Janssen, led Croniamantal 
to the region of Aix, where there was a house 

which the people of the neighborhood called le Chateau. 
Le Chateau had nothing lordly about it other than its 
name and was nothing but a vast domicile having 
a dairy and a stable. 

Mr. Janssen possessed a modest income and lived 
alone in this dwelling which he had bought in order 
to live in solitude, a suddenly broken off bethrothal 
having rendered him rather hypochondriac. He de- 
voted all his energies now to the education of the son 
of Macarée and Vierselin ‘Tigoboth: Croniamantal, 
heir of the old name of des Ygrées. 

The Dutchman, Janssen, had travelled much. He | 
spoke all the languages of Europe, Arabian, and 
Turkish, not to mention Hebrew and other dead lan- 
guages. His speech was as clear as his blue eyes. He 

[ 61] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


soon made the friendship of several scholars of Aix 
whom he would visit from time to time and he corre- 
sponded with many foreign scientists. 

When Croniamantal was six years of age, Mr. 
Janssen would often take him to the country. Cronia- 
mantal came to love these lessons along the paths of 
wooded hills. Mr. Janssen would often stop and show 
Croniamantal the birds hopping about or butterflies 
pursuing each other and fluttering together among the 
wild rose-bushes. He would say that love reigned 
over all of Nature. They would also go out on moon- 
lit nights and the master would explain to his pupil 
the hidden destinies of the heavenly bodies, their regu- 
lar course, and their effects upon the life of man. 

Croniamantal never forgot how one moonlit night 
his master led him to a field at the edge of a forest; the 
‘grass bubbled with milky light. Fireflies fluttered 
around them; their phosphorescent and jagged lights 
gave the site a strange aspect. [he master called the 
attention of his disciple to the sweetness of this May 
night. 

“Learn,” he said, “‘learn to know all of Nature 
and to love her. Let her be your veritable nurse, whose - 
salutary mammals are the moon and the hills.”’ 

Croniamantal was thirteen years of age at this 
time and his mind was quite ripe. He listened atten- 
tively to Mr. Janssen’s words. 

“T have always lived in her, but I must say, lived 

[ 62 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


badly, for one should not live without human love as 
companion. Do not forget that all is a sign of love in 
Nature. I, alas! am damned for not having observed 
this law whose demands nothing can withstand.” 

““What,”’ said Croniamantal, “‘you, my teacher, 
who know so many sciences did not recognize this 
law which every country lout and even the animals, 
the vegetables, and inert matter observe?”’ 

“Happy child who at your age can put such ques- 
tions!’’ said Mr. Janssen. ‘I have always known that 
law, from which no human being should rebel. But 
there are some luckless men destined never to know 
the joys of love. “That often happens to poets and 
scientists. [heir souls are vagabond; I am always 
conscious of existences preceding my own. This 
knowledge has never stirred any but the sterile bodies 
of scientists. (You should not be astonished in the 
least at what I say.) Whole races respect animals and 
proclaim the principle of metempsychosis, a most 
worthy belief, self-evident but fantastical, since it takes 
no account of lost forms and of their inevitable dis- 
persion. “Their worship should have extended to the 
vegetable kingdom and to minerals. For what is the 
dust of roads but the ashes of the dead? It is true that 
the Ancients did not concede life to inert matter. But 
rabbis believed that the same soul inhabited the body 
of Adam, Moses and David. In fact, the name, 
Adam, is composed in Hebrew of the letters Aleph, 

[ 63 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Daleth and Mem, the first letters of the three names. 
Your soul like mine, inhabited other human forms, 
other animals, or was dispersed and will continue so 
after your death, since all things must serve again. 
For perhaps there is nothing new any more, and crea- 
tion has ceased, perhaps . . . I affirm that I have not 
desired love, but I swear that I would not begin such 
a life over again. I have mortified my flesh and suf- 
fered severe punishment. I should like your life to 
be happy.’ . : 
Croniamantal’s master made him devote most of 
his time to the sciences, keeping him au courant with 
all recent inventions. He also instructed the boy in 
Latin and Greek. ‘They often read the Eclogues of 
Virgil or translated Theocritus in an olive grove. 
Croniamantal had learned a very pure French, 
but his master taught him in Latin. He also taught 
him Italian, and at an early age Croniamantal received 
the poems of Petrarch, who became one of his favorite 
poets. Mr. Janssen also taught Croniamantal English, 
and made him familiar with Shakespeare. Above all 
he gave the boy a taste for old French authors. Among 
the French poets he admired chiefly Villon, Ronsard 
and his pléeiade, Racine and La Fontaine. He also 
made him read translations of Cervantes and of 
Goethe. On his advice, Croniamantal read the 
romances of chivalry which might have made part of 
the library of Don Quixote. They developed in 
[ 64 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Croniamantal an unquenchable thirst for experiment 
and perilous love adventures; he devoted himself, to 
fencing and to horseback riding; at the age of fifteen 
he declared to anyone who came to visit them that he 
had decided to become a celebrated and peerless cavalier, 
and already he dreamed of a mistress. 
| Croniamantal was, at this time, a handsome youth, 
thin and straight. ‘The girls at the village fétes, when 
he touched them lightly, would stifle little bursts of 
laughter and redden, lowering their eyes under his re- 
gard. Habituated to poetic forms, his mind thought 
of love as a conquest. “Thoughts of Boccacio, his 
natural daring, his education, everything disposed him 
to take the final step. 

One May day, he went out fora long ride. It was 
morning, everything was still fresh. “The dew hung 
from the flowers of the hedges, and on either side of 
the road stretched the fields of olive trees whose gray 
leaves trembled gently in the sea breeze and compared 
agreeably with the blue sky. He arrived at a place 
where the road was being mended. “The road menders, 
handsome boys in bright colored caps, worked lazily, 
singing the while, and stopping occasionally to drink 
from their flasks. Croniamantal thought that these 
handsome fellows had sweethearts. It is thus that 
they call a lover in that country. The boys say “my 
sweetheart,’ the girls, “‘my sweetheart,’’ and in fact 


they are both sweet in that lovely country. Cronia- 
[ 65 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


mantal’s heart leaped and his whole being, exalted by 
the springtime and the riding, cried for love. 

At a turn in the road, an apparition increased his 
trouble. He arrived close to a little bridge thrown 
across a river which cut the road. ‘The place was 
isolated, and across the hedges and the trunks of pop- 
lars, he saw two beautiful girls bathing, quite naked. 
One was in the water and held herself up by a branch. 
He admired her brown arms and abundant beauties, 
hardly concealed by the water. ‘The other, standing 
on the bank, dried herself after her bath and exposed 
ravishing lines and graces which inflamed the heart of 
Croniamantal; he decided to join them and mingle in 
their pleasures. Unluckily, he perceived in the branches 
of a neighboring tree two youths spying on this prey. 
Holding their breath and. watching the least move- 
ments of the bathers, they did not see the equestrian, 
who, laughing uproariously, threw his horse into a 
gallop and cried aloud as he crossed the little bridge. 

The sun had risen almost to its zenith and was now 
darting its dreadful rays. An ardent thirst added itself 
to the amorous inquietudes of Croniamantal. ‘The 
sight of a farm along the road brought him unspeak- 
able joy. He arrived at a little orchard whose blossom- 
ing trees made a lovely sight. It was a little wood, rose 
and white with the cherry and peach blossoms. On 
the fence linen was drying and he had the pleasure of 
seeing a charming peasant girl of about sixteen, at 

[ 66 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


work washing clothes in a vat in the shadow of a fig- 
tree that had just begun to bloom. Not having noticed 
his arrival, she continued to accomplish her domestic 
function which he found noble; for, his imagination 
full of memories of antiquity, he compared her to 
Nausica. Descending from his horse he approached 
and contemplated the young girl with ravishment. He 
looked at her back. Her folded up skirt discovered a 
well made leg in a very white stocking. Her body 
moved in a manner that was pleasantly excitating be- 
cause of the efforts occasioned by the soaping. Her 
sleeves were rolled up and he observed her pretty brown 
plump arms, which enchanted him. 


I have always loved beautiful arms particularly. 
‘There are people who attach great importance to the 
perfection of the foot. I admit that they touch me 
too, but the arm is to my mind that which should be 
most perfect in woman. It is always in motion, one 
always has one’s eye upon it. One might say that it 
is the veritable organ of the graces, and that by its deft 
movements, it is the veritable arm of Love, since when 
curved, this delicate arm resembles a bow, and when 
extended, the arrow thereof. 


This was also Croniamantal’s point of view. He 
was thinking of this, when his horse, who sud- 
denly remembered that it was the habitual hour for 
being fed, began to whinny. At once the young girl 

[ 67] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


turned and showed surprise at seeing a stranger regard- 
ing her from above the fence. She blushed and only 
seemed the more charming. Her dusky skin attested 
to the Moorish blood that flowed in her veins. Cronia- 
mantal asked her for food and drink. With much 
good grace this sweet girl did have him enter the house 
and served him a rude repast. With some milk, eggs, 
and black bread, his thirst and his hunger were soon 
sated. In the meantime, he questioned his young 
hostess, in the hope of finding an opportunity for pay- 
ing her gallant compliments. He learned that her 
name was Mariette, and that her parents had gone to 
the neighboring town to sell vegetables; her brother 
was working on the road. This family lived happily 
on the products of the orchard and the barnyard. 

At this moment, her parents, fine looking peasants, 
returned, and there was Croniamantal already in love 
with Mariette, quite disappointed. He paid the mother 
for the meal, and went off, after having given Mariette 
a long look which she did not return, but he had the 
satisfaction of seeing her blush as she turned away. 

He mounted his horse and took the road to his 
house. Being for the first time in his life, sad for love, 
he found extreme melancholy in this same countryside 
which he had previously traversed. The sun had 
dropped low over the horizon. The grey leaves of the 
olive trees seemed as sad as himself. The shadows 
stretched out like waves. “The river where he had seen 

[ 68 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


the bathers was abandoned. The lapping of the water 
became unbearable for him, like a mockery. He threw 
his horse into a gallop. “Then there was the dusk, 
lights appearing in the distance. “Then night came; he 
slowed up his horse and abandoned himself to a dis- 
ordered revery. ‘he sloping road was bordered with 
cypresses, and it was thus, somnolent with the night 
and with love, that Croniamantal pursued his melan- 
choly way. 
* x * 

His master soon noticed in the days that followed 
that he gave no more attention to the studies to which 
he had been wont to apply himself with such diligence. 
He divined that this disgust came of love. 

His respect was mingled with a little scorn because 
Mariette was nothing but a simple peasant girl. 

The end of September had been reached, and one 
day Mr. Janssen led Croniamantal out under the laden 
olive trees in the orchard and censured his disciple for 
his passion, the latter hearkening to his reproaches 
with ruddy embarrassment. The first winds of autumn 
complained in the fields and Croniamantal, very sad 
and much ashamed, lost forever his desire to see again 
the pretty Mariette and kept nothing but the memory 
of her. 

* * * 
And so Croniamantal attained his majority. 
A disease of the heart which was discovered in him 
[ 69 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


led to his dismissal by the military authorities. Soon 
after, his guardian died suddenly, leaving him by will 
the little which he possessed. And after having sold 
the house called Je Chateau, Croniamantal went to 
Paris to give himself freely to his taste for literature; 
he had been for some time past composing poems 
secretly and accumulating them in an old cigar-box. 


[70] 


xX 
POETRY 


N the early days of the year 1911, a young man who 
was very badly dressed went running up the rue 
Houdon. His extremely mobile countenance seemed to 
be filled with joy and anxiety by turns. His eyes de- 
voured all that they saw and when his eyelids snapped 
shut quickly like jaws, they gulped in the universe, 
which renewed itself incessantly by the mere operation 
of him who ran. He imagined to the tiniest details 
the enormous worlds pastured in himself. ‘The clamour 
and the thunder of Paris burst from afar and about 
the young man, who stopped, and panted like some 
criminal who has been too long pursued and is ready 
to surrender himself. This clamour, this noise indi- 
cated clearly that his enemies were about to track him 
like a thief. His mouth and his gaze expressed the 
ruse he was employing, and walking slowly now, he 
took refuge in his memory, and went forward, while 
[71] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


all the forces of his destiny and of his consciousness 
retarded the time when the truth should appear of that 
which is, that which was, and of that which is to be. 

The young man entered a one story house. On the 
open door was a placard: 


Entrance to the Studios 


He followed a corridor where it was so dark and 
so cold that he had the feeling of having died, and with 
all his will, clenching his fists and gritting his teeth he 
began to take eternity to bits. “Then suddenly he was 
conscious again of the motion of time whose seconds, 
hammered by a clock, fell like pieces of broken glass, 
while life flowed in him again with the renewed passage 
of time. But as he stopped to rap at a door, his heart 
beat more strongly again, for fear of finding no one 
home. | 

He rapped at the door and cried: 

“Tt is I, Croniamantal!”’ 

_ And behind the door the heavy steps of a man who 
seemed tired, or carried too weighty a burden, came 
slowly, and as the door opened there took place in the 
sudden light: the creation of two beings and their 
instant marriage. 

In the studio, which looked like a barn, an innum- 
erable herd flowed in dispersion; they were the sleeping 
pictures, and the herdsman who tended them smiled at 

[72] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 





his friend. Upon a carpenter’s table piles of yellow 
books could be likened to mounds of butter. And 
pushing back the ill-joined door, the wind brought in 
unknown beings who complained with little cries in 
the name of all the sorrows. All the wolves of dis- 
tress howled behind the door ready to devour the flock, 
the herdsman and his friend, in order to prepare in 
their place the foundations for the NEW CITY. But 
in the studio there were joys of all colours. A great 
window opened the whole north side and nothing 
could be seen but the whole blue sky, the song of a 
woman. Croniamantal took off his coat which fell 
to the floor like the corpse of a drowned man, and 
sitting on the divan he gazed for a long time at the 
new canvas placed on the support. Dressed in a blue 
wrap, barefooted, the painter also regarded the picture 
in which two women remembered themselves in a 
glacial mist. 

‘The studio contained another fatal object, a large 
piece of broken mirror hooked to the wall. It wasa 
dead and soundless sea, standing on end, and at the 
bottom of which a false life animated what did not 
exist. “hus, confronting Art, there is the appearance 
of Art, against which men are not sufficiently on their 
suard, and which pulls them to earth when Art has 
raised them to the heights. Croniamantal bent over 
in a sitting posture, leaned his fore-arms on his knees, 
and turned his eyes from the painting to a placard 

[ 73 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


thrown on the floor on which was painted the follow- 
ing announcement: 


I AM AT THE BAR—The Bird of Benin 


He read and re-read this sentence while the Bird of 
Benin contemplated his picture, approaching it and 
withdrawing from it, his head at all angles. Finally 
he turned towards Croniamantal and said, 

“I saw the woman for you last night.” 

“Who is she?”’ asked Croniamantal. 

“T do not know, I saw her but I do not know her. 
She is a really young girl, as you like them. She has 
the sombre and child-like face of those who are des- 
tined to cause suffering. And despite all the grace of 
her hands that straighten in order to repell, she lacks 
that nobility which poets could not love because it 
would prevent their being miserable. I have seen the 
woman for you, I tell you. She is both beauty and 
ugliness; she is like everything that we love nowadays. 
And she must have the taste of the laurel leaf.’’ 

But Croniamantal, who was not listening to him, 
interrupted at this point to say: 

“Yesterday I wrote my last poem in regular verses: 


Well, 


Heil! ° 
[ 74] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


and my last poem in irregular verses (take care that 
in the second stanza the word wench is taken in its 
less reputable meaning) : 


PROSPECTUS FOR A NEW MEDICINE 


Why did Hyjalmar return 

The tankard of beaten silver lay void, 
The stars of the evening 

Became the stars of the morning 
Reciprocally 

The sorceress of the forest of Hrulde 
Prepared her repast 

She was an eater of horse-flesh 

But he was not 

Mat Mat ramaho nia nia. 


Then the stars of the morning 
Became again the stars of the evening 
And reciprocally 

They cried—In the name of Maroe 
Wench of Arnamoer 

And of his favorite zoophyte 
Prepare the drink of the gods 
—Certainly noble warrior 


Mai Mat ramaho nia nia. 
[75] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


She took the sun 

And plunged him into the sea 
As housewives 

Dip a ham in gravy 

But alas! the salmons voracious 
Have devoured the drowned sun 
And have made themselves wigs 
With his beams 


Mat Mat ramaho nia nia. 


She took the moon and did her all with bands 
As they do with the illustrious dead 

And with little children 

And then in the light of the only stars 

The eternal ones 

She made a concoction of sea-brine 

The euphorbiaceans of Norwegian resin 

And the mucous of Alfes 

To make a drink for the gods 

Mat Mat ramaho nia nia. 


He dted ltke the sun 
And the sorceress perched at the top of a fir pine 
Heard until evening 
The rumours of the great winds engulfed in the phial 
And the lying scaldas swear to this 
Mat Mat ramaho nia nia. 

[ 76 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Croniamantal was silent for an instant and then added: 
“I shall from now on write only poetry free from 
all restrictions even that of language. ° 
“Listen, old man!”’ 


MAHEVIDANOMI 
RENANOCALIPNODITOC 
EXTARTINAP ¢ v.s. 

A. Z. 
Telephone: 33-122 Pan:Pan 
OeaoiilioK Tin 


WLL111111 


“Your last line, my poor Croniamantal,’’ said the 
Bird of Benin, “‘is a simple plagiarism from Fr.nc.s 
J.mm.s."" 

“That is not true,’ said Croniamantal. “But I 
shall compose no more pure poetry. “That is what 
I have come to, through your fault. I want to write 
plays.”’ 

“You had better go to see the young woman of 
whom I spoke to you. She knows you and seems to 
be crazy about you. You will find her in the Meudon 
woods next Thursday at a place that I shall designate. 
You will recognize her by the skipping rope that she 
will hold in her hand. Her name is Tristouse Baller- 
inette.”’ 

“Very well,” said Croniamantal, “I shall go to 

[77 ] 


, 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


see Ballerinette and shall sleep with her, but above all 
I want to go to the theatres to offer my play, Ieximal 
Jelimite, which I wrote in your studio last year while 
eating lemons.” 

“Do what you want, my friend,” said the Bird of 
Benin, ‘“‘but do not forget Tristouse Ballerinette, the 
woman of your future.” 

“Well said,’ said Croniamantal. ‘“‘But I want to 
roar to you once more the plot of leximal Jelimite. 
Listen: 

‘A man buys a newspaper on the seashore. From 
the garden of a house at one side emerges a soldier 
whose hands are electric bulbs. A giant 10 feet tall 
descends from a tree. He shakes the newspaper ven- 
dor, who is of plaster and who in falling breaks to 
bits. At this moment a judge arrives. With strokes 
of a razor he kills everybody, while a leg which passes 
hopping crushes the judge with a kick in the nose, 
and sings a pretty little song.” 

“How wonderful!”’ said the Bird of Benin. “‘T 
shall paint the decoration, you have promised me that.”’ 

“That goes without saying,’’ answered Cronia- 
mantal. ” 


[78] 


Xl 
DRAMATURGY 


N the following day Croniamantal went to The 

Theatre, which was meeting at Monsieur Pingu’s, 

the financier. Croniamantal succeeded in gaining entry 

by bribing the doorman and the butler. He entered 

boldly the hall where The Theatre, its satellites, 
its stool-pigeons and its hired thugs were gathered. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
Ladies and Gentlemen of THE THEATRE, I have 
come to read you my play entitled Ieximal Jelimite. 


THE THEATRE 
Good gracious, wait a minute, young man, until 
you have been informed about our methods of pro- 
cedure. You are here in the midst of our actors, our 
authors, our critics and our spectators. Listen atten- 


tively and don’t even speak. 
[79 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


CRONIAMANTAL 
Gentlemen, I thank you for the cordial reception 
that you give me and I shall profit, | am sure, of all 


that I hear. 
THEA AGTOR 


My roles have slowly withered ltke the roses 


But mother, I love my metempsychoses 
O seals of proteus and their metamorphoses 


AN OLD STAGE MANAGER 

Do you remember, Madame! One snowy night of 
1832, a lost stranger knocked at the door of a villa 
situated on the road leading from Chanteboun to 
Sorrento. .. 

THE (CRETE 

Nowadays, for a play to be successful it is im- 

portant that it should not be signed by its author. 


THE TRAINER TO HIS BEAR 


Roll about in the sweet peas 


Play.deadi oie sticRley on 
Dance the polka . . . now the mazurka.. . 


CHORUS OF DRINKERS 
Juice o° the grape 
Ruddy liquor 
Let us drink drink 


If we may 
[ 80 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


CHORUS OF EATERS 
Horde of gluttons 
There's no more 
A crumb left 
In the plate 


DRINKERS 
Bloated heads 
Drink o drink 
The juice o the grape 


R.D.RD K.PL.NG, THE ACTOR, THE ACTRESS, 
THE AUTHORS 


(To the spectators) 
Pay! Pay! Pay! Pay! Pay! Pay! Pay! 


THE PROMPTER 

‘The theatre, my dear brothers, is a school for 
scandal, it is a place of perdition for the soul and the 
body. According to the testimony of the stage carpen- 
ters everything is faked in the theatre. Witches older 
than Morgane come there to pose as little girls of fifteen 
years. | | 

How much blood is spilt in a melodrama! I say 
truthfully, though it be false, this blood will be upon 
the heads of the children of the authors, the actors, the 
directors, and the spectators, unto the seventh genera- 
tion. Ne mater suam, the little girls used to say to 

[ 81) 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


their mothers. Nowadays they ask: ‘‘Are we going 
to the theatre tonight?”’ 

I tell you frankly my friends. ‘There are few shows 
which do not endanger the soul. Outside of the spec- 
tacle of nature I know of nothing that one may wit- 
ness without fear. [his last spectacle is Gallic and 
healthy, my dear friends. The sound dilates the glands, 
chases Satan from the stinking shades where he lies 
and thus the Fathers come in from the desert to exorcise 
themselves. 


THE MOTHER OF AN ACTRESS 
Are you p. . .,. Charlotte? 


THE ACTRESS 
No, mama, I am roasting. 


M. MAURICE BOISSARD 
We have with us today the entrails of a mother! 


AN AUTHOR WHO HAS A PLAY ACCEPTED 
BY THE COMEDIE-FRANCAISE 

My friend, you do not look very confident today. 
I am going to explain the meaning of several words 
from the theatrical vocabulary. Listen attentively and 
remember them if you can. 

Acheron (ch hard) —A river of Hades, not of hell. 

Artists (two types)—Is never used except in 
speaking of a comedian or a comedienne. 

[ 82 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Brother—Avoid using this substantive together 

with “‘little.’’ The adjective ‘‘young’’ is more proper. 

NOTA BENE—This phrase does not apply to 
operettas. 

“High Life’’—This very French expression is 
translated in English as “‘fashionable people.” 

Liaisons — They are always dangerous in the 
theatre. 

Papa—Two negatives are equal to an affirmative. 

Cooked Potatoes— (never used in the singular ) — 
A crudity that is deleterious to the stomach. 

Tut-tut— This worn expression. . . 

Would you like to have some titles for plays also? 
“They are very important in order to succeed. Here 
are some sure ones: 

THE CONTOUR; The Circumference; "THE 
CONDOR;; Hurry up Harry; THE TOWER;; Louise, 
your shirt ts coming out; STEP ALONG; The Mys- 
terious Bar; HUNDREDTH TO THE RIGHT; The 
Magician; THE GUELF; I am going to kill you; 
MY PRINCE; The Artichoke; ‘THE SCHOOL FOR 
LAWYERS; The Torch-bearer! 

Good-bye, sir, don’t thank me. 


A GREAT CRITIC 
Gentlemen, I have come to give you a report of 
the triumph, last night. Are you ready? I begin: 
[ 83 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


GRIT AND GRIP 

A play in three acts by Messrs. Julien Tandis, Jean 
de la Fente, Prosper Mordus and Mmes. Nathalie de 
l’Angoumois, Jane Fontaine and the countess M. Des 
Etangs, etc. Sets by Messrs. Alfred Mone, Leon Minie, 
Al. de Lemere. Costumes by Jeanette, hats by 
Wilhelmine, properties by the MacTead Company, 
phonographs by Hernstein and Company, sanitary 
napkins by Van Feuler Brothers. 

I recall the captive who dared to p.. . before 
Sesostris. I never saw a more poignant scene than this 
from the play of Messrs. and Mmes. etc. I must speak 
of the scene which made such a great hit at the opening 
night and in which the financier Prominoff bursts into 
a fit of rage against the coroner. 

The play, which was very good, otherwise, did not 
accomplish all that was expected of it. “—Ivhe courtesan 
wife who feathers her nest out of the green old age of a 
vulgar brewer, remains, however, an unforgettable and 
touching figure which leaves in the shadow that of 
Cleopatra and Mme. de Pompadour. M. Layol is an 
excellent comedian. He acted the father of a family 
in every sense of the expression. Mlle. Jeannine Letrou, 
a young star of tomorrow, has very pretty legs. But 
the real revelation was Mme. Perdreau whose sensitive 
nature we know so well. She acted the scene of the 
reconciliation with the most perfect naturalism. In 

[ 84 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


short a great evening and prospects for a hundred- 
night run. ° 
THE THEATRE 

Young man we are going to give some subjects for 
plays. If they were signed by famous names we would 
play them, but they are masterpieces by unknowns 
which were given to us and which we are generously 
turning over to you because of your nice face. 

PLAY WITH A THESIS—The prince of San 
Meco finds a louse on his wife’s head and makes a 
scene. [he princess has not slept with the viscount 
of Dendelope for the past six months. ‘The couple 
make a scene before the viscount, who, not having 
slept with anyone but the princess and Mme. Lafoulue, 
wife of a Secretary of State, causes the ministry to fall 
and overwhelms Mme. Lafoulue with his scorn. 

Mme. Lafoulue makes a scene with her husband. 
Everything becomes clear, however, when Monsieur 
Bibier, the Deputy, arrives. He scratches his head. 
He is stripped. He accuses his electors of being lousy. 
Finally everything is in order once more. ‘Title: 
Parliamentarism. 

COMEDY OF MANNERS—Isabelle Lefaucheux 
promises her husband that she will be faithful to him. 
Then she remembers that she has promised the same 
thing to Jules, the boy who works in their store. She 
suffers from not being able to grant her faith and her 


love. 
[35.) 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


However, Lefaucheux fires Jules. “This event pre- 
cipitates a dramatic triumph of love, and we soon find 
Isabelle cashier in a department store where Jules is 
salesman. ‘Title: Jsabelle Lefaucheux. 

HISTORICAL PLAY—The famous novelist 
Stendhal is the ringleader of a Bonapartist plot which 
ends in the heroic death of a young singer during a 
presentation of Don Juan at the Scala Theatre in 
Milan. Since Stendhal had hidden his identity under 
a pseudonym, he withdraws from the affair admirably. 
Grand marches, procession of historical personages. 

OPERA—Buridan’s ass hesitates to satisfy his 
hunger and his thirst. The she-ass of Balaam prophesies 
that the ass will die. “The golden ass comes, eats and 
drinks. “The Wild-Ass’s-Skin comes and displays his 
nudity to this assinine herd. Passing by, Sancho’'s ass 
thinks that he can prove his robustness by carrying 
off the child, but the traitor, Melo, warns the Genius 
of la Fontaine. He proclaims his jealousy and beats 
the golden ass. Metamorphoses. ‘The Prince and the 
Infant make their entrance on horseback. “The King 
abdicates in their favor. 

PATRIOTIC PLA Y—The Swedish government 
lays suit against the French Government for manufac- 
turing an imitation of “‘Swedish matches.’’ In the last 
act they exhume the remains of an alchemist of the 
XIVth Century who invented these matches, at La 
Ferté-Gaucher, a village in France, not far from Paris. 

[ 86 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


COMEDY: 
The handsome chauffeur 
Cried to his neighbor 
If you will show me your salon 
I will show you my kitchen. 
Here is enough to nourish a whole career of play- 
writing, sir. 





M. LACOUFF, SCHOLAR 

Young man, it is also important to know theatrical 
anecdotes; they help to fill out the conversation of a 
young dramatic author; here are a few: 

Frederick the Great was accustomed to having his 
court actresses whipped before each presentation. He 
believed that flagellation communicated a rosy tint to 
their skin which was not without its charm. 

At the court of the Grand Turk, the Bourgeois 
Gentilhomme was being played, but in order to adapt 
it to the taste of the environment the mamamoucht 
became a Knight of the Garter. ° 

Cecile Vestris, while returning to Mayence, one 
day, had her carriage held up by the famous Rhenish 
bandit Schinderhans. She rallied her spirits against 
this ill-fortune and danced for Schinderhans in the 
hall of a roadside tavern. 

Ibsen was sleeping one time with a young Spanish 
lady who cried out at the proper moment: 

“Now! ... now! ... Mr. Dramatist!’’ 

[ 87 } 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


An erudite actor admitted to me that he had liked 
only one statue in all his life: The Squatting Scribe, 
sculptured by an Egyptian, long before Jesus-Christ, 
and which he saw in the Louvre. But they are begin- 
ning to talk much less of Scribe, and yet he still reigns 
over the theatre. | 


THE THEATRE 

Do not forget the final scene, nor the words at the 
end, nor the fact that the more crust you have the more 
you shine, nor that a number that is cited must end in 
7 or 3 in order to seem accurate; nor not to lend money 
to anybody who says: “‘I have five acts at the Odéon,”’ 
or “I have three acts at the Comédie-Frangaise,’’ nor 
to say carelessly: ‘If you want some free passes, I have 
so many of them, that I am obliged to give them to my 
concierge;’’ that doesn’t lead to anything. 


A young man at this point made good the occa- 
sion to come and sing with equivocal gestures and a 
lascivious air, some childish and entrancing songs. 


M. PINGU 
What juice, sir! 


M. LACOUFF 
Juice of the hat? 
[ 88 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


M. PINGU 
No-no! I am mistaken. What a fluid! 
He trembles like the paunch of an archbishop. 


M. LACOUFF 
Use the proper word, not your paunch. 


M. PINGU 


What a joy, sir, what a joy! It would soften a 
crocodile to tears and would please a scholar as well 
as a financier. 


CRONIAMANTAL 


Good-bye, gentlemen, I am your devoted servant. 
With your permission I will return in a few days. | 
feel that my play is not in proper shape yet. 


[89] 











All 
LOVE 


N a spring morning, Croniamantal, following the 

instructions of the Bird of Benin, reached the 

Meudon woods and stretched himself out in the shade 
of a tree whose branches hung very low. 


CRONIAMANTAL 

God I am tired, not of walking but of being alone. 
I am thirsty—not for wine, hydromel or beer, but for 
water, fresh water from that lovely wood where the 
grass and the trees are rose at every dawn, but where 
no spring arrests the progress of the parched traveller. 
The walk has sharpened my appetite; [ am hungry, 
though not for the flesh nor for fruit, but for bread, 
good solid bread, swollen like mammals, bread, round 
as the moon and gilded as she. 


He arose then. He went deep into the woods and 
[ 93 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


came to the clearing, where he was to meet Tristouse 
Ballerinette. “he damsel had not yet arrived. Cronia- 
mantal longed for a fountain and his imagination, or 
perhaps some sorcerer’s talent in himself which he had 
never suspected, caused a limpid water suddenly to 
flow among the grass. 

Croniamantal flung himself down and drank 
avidly, when he heard the voice of a woman singing 


far off: 


Dondidondaine 7 
’T1is the shepherdess beloved of the king 
Who has gone to the fountain 
Dondidondaine 
In the dewy fields, all blossoming 
To the fountain 
But here comes Croquemitaine 
To the fountain 
And Hickorydock! advance no further. 


CRONIAMANTAL 


Dost thou think already of her who sings? Thou 
laughest dully in this clearing. Dost thou believe that 
she has been rounded like a round table for the equality 
of men and weeks? “Thou knowest well, the days do 
not resemble each other. 

About the round table, the good are no longer 
equal; one has the sun in his face, it dazzles him and 

[94] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


soon quits him for his neighbor. Another has his 
shadow before him. All are good, and good thou 
art thyself, but they are no more equal than the day 
and the night. 


THE VOICE 
Croquemitaine 
Wears the rose and the lilac 
The king rides off—Hello Germaine 
—Croquemitaine 
Thou wilt come back again 


CRONIAMANTAL 
The voices of women are always ironical. Is the 
weather always fair? Someone is already damned in- 
stead of me. It is nice in the deep woods. Hearken 
no longer to the voice of woman! Ask! Ask! 


DHE VOICE 
—Hello Germaine 
I come to love between thine arms 
—Ah! Sire, our cow is full 
—Really Germaine 
—Your servant also, I believe. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
She who sings in order to lure me will be ignorant 


as I, and dancing with lassitudes. 
[95 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


THE VOICE 
The cow 1s full 
When autumn comes she'll calve 
Farewell my king Dondidondatine 
The cow ts full 
And my heart empty without thee 


Croniamantal stands on the tip of his toes to see 
if he can perceive through the branches the so-beloved 
who comes. 

ee Vie 
Dondidondaine 
But when will come my Croquemitaine 
At the fountain it is very cold 
Dondtidondaine 
After the winter I shall be less cold. 


In the clearing there appeared a young girl, svelte 
and brunette. Her countenance was sombre and starred 
with roving eyes like birds of bright plumage. Her 
sparse but short hair left her neck bare; her hair was 
tousled and dark, and by the skipping rope which 
she carried, Croniamantal recognized her to be Tris- 
touse Ballerinette. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
No further, child with bare arms! I shall come to 
you myself. Someone has just hushed under the pines 
and will be able to overhear us. 
[96] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


TRISTOUSE 
This one is surely the issue of an egg, like Castor 
and Pollax. I recall how my mother, who was very 
foolish, used to talk to me about them of long eve- 
nings. [he hunter of serpent’s eggs, son of the 
serpent himself,—I am afraid of those old memories. 


CRONIAMANTAL 

Have no fear, woman of the naked arms. Stay 
with me. My lips are filled with kisses. Here, here. 
I lay them on thy brow, on thy hair. I caress thy hair 
with its ancient perfume. I caress thy hairs which 
intertwine like the worms on the bodies of the dead. 
O death, o death, hairy with worms. I have kisses on 
my lips. Here, here they are, on thy hands, on thy 
neck, on thine eyes, thine eyes. I have lips full of 
kisses, here, here, burning like a fever, sustained to 
enchant thee, kisses, mad kisses, on the ear, the temple, 
the cheek. Feel my embraces, bend under the effort of 
my arm, be languid, be languid. I have kisses upon 
my lips, here, here, mad ones, upon thine eyes, upon 
thy neck, upon thy brow, upon thy youth, I longed 
so to love thee, this spring day when there are no more 
blossoms on the branches which prepare themselves to 
bear fruit. 

TRISTOUSE 

Leave me, go away. “Those who move each other 

are happy, but I do not love you. You frighten me. 
[ 97 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


However, do not despair, o poet. Listen, this is my 
best advice: Go away! 


CRONIAMANTAL 
Alas! Alas! ‘To leave again, to wander unto the 
oceanic limits, through the brush, the evergreen, in the 
scum, in the mud, the dust, across the forests, the 
prairies, the plantations, and the very happy gardens. 


TRISTOUSE 


Goaway. Go away, far from the antique perfume 
of my hair, o thou who belongest to me. 


And Croniamantal went off without turning his 
head once; he could be seen for a long time through the 
branches, and then his voice could be heard growing 
fainter and fainter as he disappeared from view. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
Traveller without a stick, pilgrim without staff 
and poet without a writing pad, I am more powerless 
than all other men, I own nothing more and I know 
nothing. .. 


And his voice no longer reached Tristouse Ballerin- 
ette who was admiring her image in the pool. 


In another age monks cultivated the forest of 
Malverne. 
[ 98 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


MONKS 
The sun declines slowly, and blessing thee, O Lord; 
we are going to sleep in the monastery so that the dawn 
may find us in the forest. 


THE FOREST OF MALVERNE 
Every day, every day, flights of anguished birds 
see their nests crushed and their eggs broken when the 
trees sway with shaking branches. 


THE BIRDS 
It is the happy hour of twilight when the girls and 
boys come to roll on the grass. And all of them have 
kisses that want to fall like over-ripe fruit or like the 
egg when it is about to be laid. Do you see them there, 
do you see them dance, muse, haunt, chant from dusk 
to the dawn, his pale sister? 


A RED-HAIRED MONK 
(In the middle of the Cortége) 
I am afraid to live and I should like to die. Con- 
vulsions of earth, Labor! O lost time. 


THE BIRDS 
Gay! Gay! the broken eggs 
The ready-made omelette cooked on a downy fire 
Here! Here! 
Take to the right 
[99 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Turn to the left 
Straight ahead 

Behind the fallen oak 
There and everywhere. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
(In another age, near the Forest of Malverne and a 
little before the passage of the monks.) 

The winds disperse before me, the forests fall away 
and become a wide track with corpses here and there. 
The travellers meet with too many corpses for some 
time, with garrulous corpses. 


THE RED-HAIRED MONK 
I don’t want to work any more, I want to dream 
and pray. 


He sleeps, his face turned to the sky, on the road 
bordered with willows of the color of mist. 

The night had come with the moonlight. Cronia- 
mantal saw the monks bent over the nonchalant bodies 
of their brothers. Then he heard a little plaint, a feeble 
cry that died in a last sigh. And slowly they passed 
in Indian file before Croniamantal, who was hidden 
behind a clump of willows. 


THE GLORIDE FOREST 
I should love to send this man astray amid the 
spectres that float among the bubbles. But he flees 
[ 100 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


toward the times that come, and whither he is already 
arrived. 


The banging of distant doors changes into the 
sound of trains in motion. A large, grassy track, 
barred by trunks and fenced with enormous joined 
stones. Life commits suicide. A path that people 
follow. “They never tire. Subways where the air is 
poisoned. Corpses. Voices call Croniamantal. He 
runs, he runs, he descends. 


*K >K *K 


In the lovely woods, Tristouse promenaded medi- 
tating. 


TRISTOUSE 

My heart is sad without thee, Croniamantal. I 
loved thee without knowing it. All is green. All is 
green above my head and beneath my feet. I have lost 
him whom I loved. I must search this way and that 
way, here and yonder. And among them all I shall 
surely find someone who will please me. 

Returned from other times, Croniamantal cried out 
at sight of Tristouse and the fountain again: 


CRONIAMANTAL 
Goddess! who art thou? Where is thine eternal 
form? 
[101] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


TRISTOUSE 
Oh, there he is again, handsomer than ever. . . 
Listen, o poet. I belong to thee, henceforth. 
Without looking at Tristouse, Croniamantal bent 
over the pool. 
CRONIAMANTAL 


I love fountains, they are beautiful symbols of 
immortality when they never run dry. ‘This one has 
never run dry. And I seek a divinity, but I desire her 
to appear eternal to me. And my fountain has never 
run dry. 


He knelt and prayed to the fountain, while Tris- 
touse, all in tears, lamented. 


TRISTOUSE 


O poet, adorest thou the fountain? O Lord, re- 
turn my lover to me! Come to me! I know such 
lovely songs. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
‘The fountain hath its murmur. 


TRISTOUSE 


Very well, then! Sleep with thy cold lover, let 
her drown thee! But if thou livest, thou belongest 
to me and thou shalt obey me. | 


She was gone, and throughout the forest of twitter- 
[ 102 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 





ing birds, the fountain flowed and murmured, while 
there arose the voice of Croniamantal who wept and 
whose tears mingled with the worshipped flood. 


CRONIAMANTAL 

O fountain! “Thou who springest like a staunch- 
less blood. “Thou who art cold as marble, but living, 
transparent and fluid. ‘Thou, ever renewed and ever 
thesame. “Thou who makest living thy verdant banks, 
I love thee. Thou art my unrivalled goddess. Thou 
quenchest my thirst. “Thou purifiest me. Thou mur- 
murest to me thine eternal song which rocks me to 
sleep in the evenings. 


THE FOUNTAIN 

At the bottom of my little bed full of an Orient 
of gems, I hear thee with contentment, o poet whom 
I have enchanted. I recall Avallon where we might 
have lived, thou as the King Fisher and I awaiting thee 
under the appletrees. O islands of appletrees. But I 
am happy in my precious little bed. “These amethysts 
are sweet to my gaze. ‘This lapis-lazuli is more blue 
than a fair sky. ‘This malachite represents to me a 
prairie. Sardonyx, onyx, agate, rock-crystal, you shall 
scintillate tonight, for I will give a feast in honor of 
my lover. I shall come alone as befits a virgin. The 
power of my lover has already been manifested and 
his gifts are sweet to my soul. He has given me his 

[ 103 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


eyes all in tears, two adorable fountains, sweet tribu- 
taries of my stream. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
O fecund fountain, thy waters resemble thy hair. 
‘Thy flowers are born about thee and we shall love 
each other always. 


Nothing could be heard but the song of birds and 
the rustling of leaves, and at times the plashing of a 
bird playing in the water. 


A dandy appeared in the little wood: It was 
Paponat the Algerian. He approached the fountain 
dancing. 


CRONIAMANTAL 


I know you. You are Paponat who studied in 
the Orient. 


PAPONAT 

Himself. O poet of the Occident, I come to visit 
you. I have learned of your enchantment, but I hear 
that it is not yet too late to converse with you. How 
humid it is here! It is not at all surprising that your 
voice is harsh, and you will certainly need a medica- 
ment to clear it. I approached you dancing. Is there 
no way of saving you from the situation in which 
you have placed yourself. 

[ 104 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


CRONIAMANTAL 
Bah! But tell me who taught you to dance. 


PAPONAT 
The angels themselves were my dancing masters. 


CRONIAMANTAL 


The good or the bad angels? But no matter. I 
have had enough of all the dances, save one which the 
Greeks call Rordax. 


PAPONAT 


You are gay, Croniamantal, we shall be able to 
amuse ourselves. [am glad I came here. [ love gaiety. 
Iam happy! 

And Paponat, his bright eyes profoundly whirling, 
rubbed his hands gleefully. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
You look like me! 


PAPONAT 


Not much. I am happy to live, while you die 
beside the fountain. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
But the happiness which you proclaim, do you 
not forget it? and forget mine? You resemble me! 
The happy man rubs his hands. Smell them. What 
do they smell like? 
[ 105 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


PAPONAT 
‘The odour of death. 


CRONIAMANTAL 
Ha! ha! ha! The happy man has the same odour 
as death! Rub your hands. What difference between 
the happy man and the corpse! I am also happy, 
although I don’t want to rub my hands. Be happy, 
rub your hands. Be happy! again! Now do you 
know it, the odour of happiness? 


PAPONAT 
Farewell. If you make no case for the living, there 
is no way of talking to you. 


And as Paponat disappeared into the night where 
glittered the innumerable eyes of the celestial animals 
of impalpable flesh, Croniamantal rose suddenly think- 
ing to himself: ‘““Well—enough of the beauties of 
Nature and of the thoughts she evokes. I know enough 
about that for a long time; we had better return to 
Paris and try to find that exquisite little Tristouse 
who loves me madly.” 


[ 106 ] 


XIII 
MODES 


APONAT who came back that night from the 
Meudon woods where he had gone in search of 
adventure arrived just in time to take the last boat. 
He had the good luck to run into Tristouse Ballerinette 
there. 

““‘How are you, young lady?” he asked. “I just 
saw your lover, Croniamantal, in the woods. He is 
on the verge of going mad.”’ 

“My lover?” said Tristouse. ‘He is not my lover.”’ 

‘He is said to be. At least they have been saying 
he is, in our literary and artistic circles, ever since yester- 
day.” 

“They can say whatever they want,’ said Tris- 
touse firmly. “Anyway I shall have nothing to be 
ashamed about in sucha lover. Is he not handsome and 
has he not a great talent?”’ | 

“You are right. But my, what a pretty hat you 

[ 107 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


have, and what a pretty dress! I am very much inter- 
ested in the fashions.”’ 

“You are always very elegant, Mr. Paponat. Give 
me the address of your tailor and I shall tell Cronia- 
mantal about it.”’ 

“Quite useless, he would not use it,’’ said Paponat 
laughing. “But tell me now, what are the women 
wearing this year? I have just come from Italy and 
I am not in touch with things. Please tell me all about 
ite 

“This year,’’ began Tristouse, ‘the modes are very 
bizarre and familiar, simple and yet full of fantasy. 
All material belonging to the different processes of 
Nature may now enter into the composition of a 
woman’s costume. I have seen a robe made of cork. 
It was certainly as good as the charming evening gowns 
of towel which created such a rage at premiéres. A 
great couturier is thinking of launching tailor-made 
costumes of the backs of old books, bound in calf. 
Charming! All literary women will want to wear it, 
and one can approach them and whisper into their ears 
under the guise of reading the titles of the books. Fish- 
skeletons are also worn much with hats. You may 
see delightful young girls, very often, wearing cloaks 
a la Saint-Jacques de Compostelle; their costume, so 
it is said, is starred with Saint Jacques shells. Porce- 
lain, stone work and china have suddenly taken an 
important place in the sartorial art. “These materials 

[ 108 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


are worn in belts, on hat-pins, etc.; I have had the 
good luck to see an adorable reticule all made of the 
glass eyes that occulists use. Feathers are used not 
only to decorate hats with, but shoes, gloves, and next 
year they will even be used with umbrellas. Shoes 
are being made of Venetian glass and hats out of 
Bohemian crystal. Not to mention oil-painted gowns, 
highly colored woolens, and robes bizarrely spotted 
with ink. In the Spring many will wear dresses made 
of puffed gold leaf, with pleasant shapes, giving light- 
ness and distinction. Our aviatrices will wear nothing 
else. or the races there will be the hat made of toy 
balloons, about twenty at a time being used, giving a 
luxuriant effect, and very diverting explosions from 
time to time. “The mussel-shell will be worn on slip- 
pers. And note that they are beginning to dress with 
living animals. I met a woman who wore on her hat 
at least twenty birds: canaries, goldfinches, robins, 
held by a string tied to their feet, all singing at the top 
of their voices and flapping their wings. “The head- 
dress of an ambassadress, ever since the last Neuilly 
fair is made up of a coil of about thirty snakes. ‘For 
whom are those snakes that hiss overhead?’ asked the 
little Roumanian attaché with his Dacian accent, who 
was supposed to be quite a ladies’ man. I forgot to tell 
you that last Wednesday I saw a lady on the boule- 
vards with a ruff having little mirrors laid together 
and pasted to the material. In the sunlight the effect 
[ 109 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


was sumptuous. One might have thought it a gold 
mine on a promenade. Later it began to rain and the 
lady resembled a silver mine. Nutshells make pretty 
buttons, especially if they are interspersed with filberts. 
A robe embroidered with coffee grains, cloves, cloves 
of garlic, onions, and bunches of raisins, is proper 
to wear when visiting. Fashion is becoming prac- 
tical and no longer spurns any object, but ennobles 
all. It does for these things what romanticists do 
with words.” 

“Thank you,”’ said Paponat, “‘you have given me 
a great deal of information and told it charmingly.” 

“You are too kind,’’ replied Tristouse. 


[ 110 ] 


XIV 
ENCOUNTERS 


LX months passed. For the last five Tristouse Bal- 
lerinette had been the mistress of Croniamantal, 
whom she loved passionately for eight days. In ex- 
change for this love, the lyrical youth had rendered 
her glorious and immortal forever by celebrating her 
in marvellous poems. 

“T was unknown,” she mused, ‘“‘and now he has 
made me illustrious among all the living. 

“TI was thought ugly because of my thinness, my 
large mouth, my bad teeth, my irregular features, my 
crooked nose. Now I am beautiful and all men tell 
meso. [hey mocked at my clumsy and jerky gait, 
at my sharp elbows which, when I walked, moved like 
the feet of geese. 

“What miracles are born of the love of a poet! 
But how heavily a poet’s love weighs! What sorrows 
accompany it, what silences to endure! Now that the 

[111] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


miracle has been accomplished, I am beautiful and 
renowned. Croniamantal is ugly, he has wasted his 
property in a short time; he is poor, lacking in elegance, 
no longer gay; the slightest of his gestures make him a 
hundred enemies. 

“T love him no longer. I need him no longer, 
my admirers are enough for me. I shall rid me of him 
gradually. But that is going to be very annoying. 
Either I must go away, or he must disappear, so that 
he doesn’t bother me, and so that he isn’t able to re- 
proach me.” | 

And after eight days, ‘Tristouse became the mistress 
of Paponat, although still seeing Croniamantal, whom 
she treated more and more coldly. ‘The less she came to 
see him, the more desperately he cared for her. When 
she did not come at all, he spent hours in front of the 
house she lived in in the hope of seeing her come out, 
and if by chance she did, he would escape like a thief, 
fearing that she might accuse him of spying on her. 


*K *K *K 


It was by running around after Tristouse Baller- 
inette that Croniamantal continued his literary edu- 
cation. 

One day as he was wandering about Paris, he 
suddenly found himself at the Seine. He crossed a 
bridge and walked for some time, when suddenly per- 
ceiving before him M. Francois Coppée, Croniamantal 

[112] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


regretted that this passerby was dead. But there is 
nothing against talking with the dead, and the encoun- 
ter passed off very pleasantly. | 

“Come,” thought Croniamantal, ‘‘to a passerby 
he would appear to be nothing but a passerby, and 
the very author of the Passerby.*° He is a clever and 
spiritual rhymester, with some feeling for reality. Let 
us speak to him about rhyme.”’ 

The poet of the Passerby was smoking a dark 
cigarette. He was dressed in black, his visage black; 
he stood bizarrely on a high stone, and Croniamantal 
saw quite easily by his pensive air that he was com- 
posing verses. He came alongside of him and after 
having greeted him, said brusquely: 

“Dear master, how sombre you seem.”’ 

He replied courteously. 

“It is because my statue is of bronze. That exposes 
me constantly to scorn. “Thus the other day, 


Passing by one day the negro Sam MacV ea 
Seeing I was the blacker, sat down and muttered: 
*Y ea.’ 


“See how adroit those lines are. Did you notice 
how well the couplet I just recited for you rhymes for 
the eye.” 

‘Indeed,’ said Croniamantal, “‘for it is pronounced 
Sam Mac Vee, like Shakespeer.”’ 

[113 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“Well here is something that comes off better,’”’ con- 
tinued the statue: 


Passing by one day the negro Sam MacVea 
Christened this tablet with a flask of eau-de-vie. 


‘There is a bit of refinement that ought to appeal 
to you. It is the rime riche, the perfect rhyme to delight 
the ear.”’ 

“You certainly enlighten me on the rhyme,” said 
Croniamantal. “I am very happy, dear master, to 
have met you in passing by.”’ 

“It is my first success,’ replied the metallic poet. 
“But I have just composed a little poem bearing the 
same title: it is about a gentleman who passes by, The 
Passerby, across the corridor of a railroad coach; he 
perceives a charming lady with whom, instead of going 
only to Brussels, he stops at the Dutch frontier: 


They passed at least eight days at Rosendael 
He tasted the ideal, she the real 

In all things, tt chanced, their ways differed, 
It was from veritable Love they suffered. 


“T call your attention to the last two lines, which 
through rhyming somewhat imperfectly contain a 
subtle dissonance, which is further emphasized by the 
fact of their being morbidly feminine rhymes.” 

[114] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“Dear master,’’ exclaimed Croniamantal, ‘‘speak to 
me of vers libre.”’ 

“Long live liberty!’’ cried the bronze statue. 

And having saluted him, Croniamantal went his 
way looking for Tristouse. 

* x * 

On another day Croniamantal was walking along 
the boulevards. ‘Tristouse had missed an appointment 
with him, and he hoped to find her in a tea room where 
she sometimes went with her friends. He turned the 
corner of the rue Le Peletier, when a gentleman, dressed 
in a pearl-grey cape, accosted him, saying: 

“Sir, Lam going to reform literature. I have found 
a superb subject: it is about the sensations of a well 
bred young bachelor who permits an improper sound 
to escape in an assemblage of ladies and young people 
of good family.”’ 

Croniamantal was properly amazed at the novelty 
of the subject, but understood at once how much it 
would take to test the sensibilities of the author. 

Croniamantal fled. . . A lady stepped on his feet. 
She was also an authoress, and did not neglect to 
inform him that this incident would furnish him with 
a subject of fresh and delicate character. 

Croniamantal took to his heels and reached the 
Pont des Saint Péres where three people were disputing 
over the subject of a novel and begged him to decide 
who was right; it was about the case of an officer. 

[115] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


‘Fine subject,’’ cried Croniamantal. 

‘Listen,’ said his neighbor, a bearded man, ‘I 
claim that the subject is too new and too unusual for 
the present day public.”’ 

And the third man explained that it was about an 
officer of a restaurant company, the man who held 
office, who presided over the soiled dishes. . . 

Croniamantal did not reply to them but made off 
to visit an old cook who wrote verse, and at whose 
place he hoped to find Tristouse at tea time. Tristouse 
was not there, but Croniamantal was hugely enter- 
tained by the mistress of the house who declaimed some 
poems to him. 

It was a poetry that was full of profundity, and 
in which words had a new meaning entirely. “Thus 
archipel was only used in the sense of papier buvard. ™ 

* * * 

Some time later, the rich Paponat, proud of being 
the lover of the renowned Tristouse, and desirous of 
not losing her, for she did him honor, decided to take 
his mistress for a trip through Central Europe. 

‘Fine,’ said ‘Tristouse, “but we will not travel as 
lovers, for even though you are nice to me, [I don’t love 
you enough, or at least I force myself to the point of not 
loving you. We shall travel as two friends, and I shall 
dress up as a young man; my hair is rather short, and 
I have often been told that I have the air of a hand- 
some young man.” 

[ 116 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“Very well,” said Paponat, ‘‘and since we both 
are in need of repose we shall make our retreat in 
Moravia in a convent of Briinn where my uncle, the 
prior of Crepontois, retired after the expulsion of the 
monks. It is one of the richest and finest convents in 
the world. I shall present you as one of my friends, 
and have no fear, we shall be taken for lovers just the 
same.” 

“That suits me,’ said Tristouse, ‘for I love to 
pass for that which I am not. We leave tomorrow.”’ 


[ 117] 


XV 
VOY AGE 


RONIAMANTAL went perfectly mad upon hear- 

ing of the departure of Tristouse. But at this 

time he began to become famous, and as his poetical 
repute waxed so did his vogue as a dramatist. 

The theatres played his plays and the crowd 
applauded his name, but at the same moment the 
enemies of poets and poetry were increasing in number 
and growing in audacious hatred. 

He only became more and more sorrowful, his soul 
shrinking within his enfeebled body. 

When he learned of the departure of Tristouse he 
did not protest, but simply asked the concierge if she 
knew the destination of the voyage. 

“All that I know,” said the woman, “‘is that she 
has gone to Central Europe.”’ 

“Very well,’’ said Croniamantal, and returning to 
his quarters he gathered up the several thousand francs 

[ 118 ] 


fae? POET ASSASSINATED 


he still possessed and took the train for Germany at 
the Gare du Nord. 


On the following day, Christmas eve, the train was 
engulfed in the enormous terminal of Cologne. Cronia- 
mantal, carrying a little valise, descended last from his 

third-class coach. 

| On the platform of the opposite track the red cap 
of the station master, the spiked helmets of policemen, 
and the silk hats of high functionaries indicated that 
an important person was awaited by the next train. 
And to be sure Croniamantal heard a little old man, 
with quick gestures, explaining to his fat wife who 
gaped with astonishment at the spiked helmets, the 
red cap, and the silk hats: 

“Krupp. . . Essen. . . No orders. . . Italy.” 

Croniamantal followed the crowd of passengers 
who had come in on his train. He walked behind two 
girls, who must have been pigeon-toed, so much did 
their gait resemble that of the goose. They kept their 
hands concealed under short cloaks; the head of the 
first one was covered with a small black hat, from 
which there dangled a bouquet of blue roses, as well 
as some straight, black feathers, with the stem trimmed 
except at the tip, which trembled as if with cold. ‘The 
hat of the other girl was of a soft, almost brilliant felt, 
an enormous knot of satinette shrouding her with 
ridicule. “They were probably two servant maids out 

[119 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


of a job, for they were pounced upon at the exit by 
a group of strait-laced and ugly ladies wearing the 
ribbon of the Catholic Society for the Protection of 
Young Girls. The ladies of the Protestant Society for 
the same purpose stood a little further off. Cronia- 
mantal following behind a stout man with a short, 
hard and russet beard, dressed in green, descended the 
stairway that led to the vestibule of the station. 

Outside he saluted the Dome, solitary in the midst 
of the irregular square which it filled with its bulk. 
‘The station heaped its modern mass close to the huge 
cathedral. Hotels spread their signs in hybrid lan- 
guages and appeared to hold their respectful distance 
from the gothic colossus. Croniamantal sniffed the 
odour of the town for a long time. He seemed to be 
disappointed. 

“She is not here,’’ he said to himself, ““my nose 
would smell her, my nerves would vibrate, my eyes 
would see her.”’ 

He crossed the town, passed the fortifications on 
foot as if driven by un unknown force along the main 
road, downstream, on the right bank of the Rhine. 
And in truth, Tristouse and Paponat had arrived the 
night before in Cologne, taken an automobile and con- 
tinued their journey; they had taken the right bank 
of the Rhine in the direction of Coblenz, and Cronia- 
mantal was following their trail. 

[ 120 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Christmas eve came. An old prophet of a rabbi 
from Dollendorf, just as he was venturing upon the 
bridge which links Bonn with Buel, was repulsed by 
a violent gust of wind. ‘The snow fell in a great rage. 
‘The sound of the gale drowned all the Christmas 
songs, but the thousand lights of the trees glittered 
in each house. 

‘The old Jew swore: 

“Kreuzdonnerwetter . .. 1 shall never get to 
Haenchen . . . Winter, my old friend, thou canst 
avail nothing against my old and joyous carcass, let 
me cross without hindrance this old Rhine which is 
as drunken as thirty-six drunkards. As to myself, I 
bend my steps toward the noble tavern frequented by 
the Borussians only to tipple in company with those 
white bonnets and at their cost, like a good Christian, 
although I am a Jew.” 

The sound of the gale doubled in fury, strange 
voices made themselves heard. “The old rabbi shivered 
and raised his head crying: 

“Donnerkeil! Ui jeh, ch, ch, ch. Eh! Say, up 
there, you ought to go about your business instead of 
making life miserable for poor happy devils whose fate 
sends them abroads on such nights . . . Eh! mothers, 
are you no longer under the domination of Solomon? 
. . . Ohey! Ohey! Tseilom Kop! Meicabl! Far- 
waschen Ponim! Beheime! You want to prevent me 
from drinking the excellent Moselle wines with the 

[1211 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


students of Borussia who are only too happy to toast 
with me because of my science and my inimitable 
lyricism, not to mention all my talents for sorcery and 
prophecy. 

““Accursed spirits! know ye that I might have 
drunk also Rhine wines, not to mention the wines of 
France. Nor should I have neglected to polish off 
some champagne in your honor, my old friends! . . . 
At midnight, the hour when the Christkindchen is 
made, I should have rolled under the table and have 
slept at least during the brawling ... But you 
unchain the winds, you make an infernal uproar during 
this saintly night which should have been peaceful. . . 
as to being calm, you seem to be twisting his pigtail 
up there, sweet ladies . . . ‘To amuse Solomon, no 
doubt . . . Lilith! Naama! Aguereth! Mahala! Ah! 
Solomon, for thy pleasure they are going to kill all 
the poets on this earth. 

“Ah Solomon! Solomon! jovial king whose enter- 
tainers are the four nocturnal spectres moving from the 
Orient to the North, thou desirest my death, for I am 
also a poet like all the Jewish prophets and a prophet 
like all the poets. 

“Farewell drunkenness for tonight... Old 
Rhine, I must turn my back to thee. Iam going back 
to prepare me for death and dictate my last and most 
lyrical prophecies . . .” 

A horrible crash, like a stroke of thunder, burst 

[ 122 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


just then. ‘The old prophet pressed his lips together, 
lowering his head and looking down; then he bent 
down and held his ear quite close to the ground. When 
he straightened up he murmured: 

“The earth herself can no longer suffer the unbear- 
able contact with poets.”’ 

Then he took his way across the streets of Buel, 
turning his back on the Rhine. When the rabbi had 
traversed the railroad track he found himself before a 
crossing and as he hesitated not knowing which to 
take, he lifted his head again by chance. He saw before 
him a young man with a valise coming from Bonn; 
the old rabbi did not recognize the person and cried 
to him: 

“Are you mad to go out in such weather, sir?”’ 

“I am hurrying to rejoin someone whom I have 
lost and whose track I am following,” replied the 
stranger. 

“What is your profession,’’ cried the Jew. 

ei amra poet.” 

The prophet stamped with his foot and as the 
young man disappeared he cursed him horribly because 
of the pity he felt, then lowering his head he went to 
look at the signposts along the road. Wheezing, he 
took the road straight ahead of him. 

“Happily the wind is fallen . . . at least one can 
walk . . . I had thought at first that he was coming 
to kill me. But, no, he will probably die even before 

[ 123 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


me, this poet who is not even a Jew. Well, let us go 
quick and merrily to prepare us a glorious death.”’ 

The old rabbi walked faster; with his long cloak 
he gave the effect of a returned spirit, and some chil- 
dren who were returning from Putzchen after the 
’ Christmas Tree party passed him crying with terror, 
and for a long time they threw stones in the direction 
in which he had disappeared. 


* *K *K 


Croniamantal covered in this way part of Germany 
and the Austrian Empire; the force that propelled him 
drew him across Thuringia, Saxony, Bohemia, Mor- 
avia, up to Briinn, where he decided to stop. 

On the very night of his arrival, he scoured the 
town. Along the streets surrounding the old palace 
enormous Swiss guards in breeches and cocked hats, 
were standing before the doors. ‘They leaned on long 
canes with crystal heads. “Their gold buttons gleamed 
like the eyes of cats. Croniamantal lost his way; he 
wandered about for some time in poor streets where 
shadows passed vividly across drawn blinds. Officers 
in long blue coats passed by. Croniamantal turned to 
glance at them, then he walked outside of the town 
with night coming on, to look at the sombre mass of 
the Spielberg. While he was looking at the old state 
prison, he heard the sound of feet close by and then 
saw three monks pass gesticulating and talking loudly. 

[124] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


Croniamantal ran after them and asked them direc- 
tions. 

“You are French,’’ they said; “come with us.” 

Croniamantal examined them and noticed that they 
wore above their frocks little beige cloaks that were 
very elegant. Each one carried a light cane and worea 
melon-shaped hat. On the way one of the monks 
said to Croniamantal: | 

“You have wandered far from your hotel, we will 
show you the way if you wish. But if you care to, 
you may certainly come to the convent with us: you 
will be well received because you are a foreigner and 
you can pass the night there.”’ 

Croniamantal accepted joyfully, saying: 

“I shall be very glad to come, for aren’t you 
brothers to me, who am a poet.”’ 

They began to laugh. ‘The oldest, who wore a 
gold-framed lorgnon and whose belly puffed out of 
his fashionable waistcoat, raised his arms and cried: 

“A poet! Is it possible!’’ 

And the two others, who were thinner, choked 
with laughter, bending down and holding their bellies 
as if they had the colic. 

“Let us be serious,’ said the monk with the 
lorgnon, “we are going to pass through a street 
inhabitated by the Jews.”’ 

In the streets, at every step, old women standing 
like pines in a forest, called them, making signals. 

[ 125 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


‘Let us flee from this stench,’’ said the fat monk, 
who was a Czech and who was called Father Karel 
by his companions. 

Croniamantal and the monks stopped at last before 
a great convent door. At the sound of the bell the 
porter came to let them in. “The two thin monks said 
good-bye to Croniamantal, who remained alone with 
Father Karel in a parlor that was richly furnished. 

“My child,’’ said Father Karel, “‘you are in a 
unique convent. “The monks who inhabit it are all 
very proper people. We have old archdukes, and even 
former architects, soldiers, scientists, poets, inventors, 
a few monks expelled from France, and some lay guests 
of good breeding. All of them are saints. I, myself, 
such as you see me, with my lorgnon and my pot-belly, 
am a saint. I shall show you your room, where you 
may stay until nine o'clock; then you will hear the 
bell ring and I shall come to look for you.” 

Father Karel guided Croniamantal through long 
corridors. [hen they went up a stairway of. white 
marble and on the second floor, Father Karel opened a 
door and said: 

“Your room.” 

He showed him the electric button and left. 

The room was round, the bed and the chairs were 
round; on the chimney piece a skull looked like an old 
cheese. | 

Croniamantal stood by the window, under which 

[ 126 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


spread the teeming darkness of a large monastery gar- 
den, from which there seemed to rise laughter, sighs, 
cries of joy, as if a thousand couples were embracing 
each other. Then a woman’s voice in the garden sang 
a song which Croniamantal had heard before: 


. .Croguemitaine 
Wears the rose and the lilac 
The King ts a-coming 
—Hello Germaine 
—Croquemitaine 
Wilt thou come back again? 


And Croniamantal began to sing the rest: 


—RHello Germaine 
I come to love among thine arms. 


Then he heard the voice of Tristouse continuing 
the couplet. 

And voices of men here and there, sang airs that 
were strange or grave, while the cracked voice of an 
old man stuttered: 


Vexilla regis prodeunt .. . 


At this moment Father Karel entered the room, as 
a bell rang full force. 
“Well, my boy! Listening to the sounds of our 
[127] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


fine garden? It is full of memories, this earthly para- 
dise. [ychobrahé made love there with a pretty 
Jewess who said to him all the time: Chazer,—which 
means pig in the jargon.” I myself, have seen such 
and such an archduke play with a pretty boy whose 
behind was shaped like a heart. Let us come to 
dinner.”’ : 

They arrived in a vast refectory still empty, and 
the poet examined at his leisure the frescoes which 
covered the wall. 

One was of Noah, dead-drunk on a couch. His 
son Cham was uncovering his nakedness, that is to say 
the root of a vine naively and prettily painted whose 
branches served as a genealogical tree, or something of 
the sort, for they had painted the names of all the abbés 
in red letters on all the leaves. 

The marriage of Cana showed a Mannekenpis 
pissing wine into the casks while the spouse, at least 
eight months with child, offered her belly to someone 
who was writing on it in charcoal: TOKAI 

And then again there was a fresco of the soldiers 
of Gideon relieving themselves of the awful colic caused 
by the water they had drunk. 

The long table that covered the middle of the hall 
was spread with a rare sumptuousness. he glasses 
and decanters were of Bohemian cut-glass, and of the 
finest red crystal. “The superb silver pieces glittered 
on the whiteness of the cloth strewn with violets. 

[ 128 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


The monks arrived one by one, their hoods on 
their heads, arms folded on their breasts. On entering 
they greeted Croniamantal and took their accustomed 
places. As they came in, Father Karel informed 
Croniamantal of their name and what country they 
came from. ‘The table was soon filled and Cronia- 
mantal counted fifty-six of them. The Abbé, an 
Italian with narrow eyes, said grace and the repast 
began, but Croniamantal anxiously awaited the arrival 
of Tristouse. 

A bouillon was served in which there swam little 
brains of birds and sweet peas. . . 


*K *K *K 


“Our two French guests have just left,’ said a 
French monk who had been the prior of Crepentois. 
“T could not hold them here: the companion of my 
nephew was just singing in the garden in his pretty 
soprano voice. He almost fainted at hearing some one 
in the convent sing the close of the song. ‘They left 
just now and took the train, for their automobile 
was not ready. We shall send it on to them by rail. 
They did not impart to me the destination of their 
journey, but I think that the pious children are bound 
for Marseilles. At least, I think I heard them talk 
of that town.”’ 

Croniamantal, pale as a sheet, rose, then: 

“Excuse me, good fathers,’ he said, “‘but it was 

[ 129 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


wrong of me to accept your hospitality. I must go 
away, do not ask me the reason. But I shall keep a 
fond memory of the simplicity, the gaiety, the liberty 
that reign here. All that is dear to me to the highest 
degree, why, why, alas, can I not profit of it?”’ 


[ 130 ] 


AVI 
PERSECUTION 


‘T’ this time prizes for poetry were being awarded 
every day. Thousands of societies had been 
founded for this purpose and their members lived on 
the fat of the land, while making upon fixed dates 
large benefices to poets. But the 26th of January was 
the day upon which the largest associations, companies, 
boards of directors, academies, committees, juries, etc., 
of the whole world bestowed their awards. Upon 
this day 8,019 prizes for poetry were distributed, the 
total of which aggregated 50,005,225 francs. On 
the other hand, since the taste for poetry had never 
spread among any class of the population of any 
country, public opinion had risen powerfully against 
the poets who were called parasites, lazy, useless, and 
so forth. “The 26th of January of this year passed 
without incident, but on the following day the great 
newspaper, La Voix, published at Adelaide (Aus- 
[131] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


tralia) in the French language, contained an article by 
the distinguished agricultural chemist Horace Tograth 
(a German born at Leipzig), whose discoveries and 
inventions had frequently seemed to border on the 
miraculous. ‘The article, entitled The Laurel, con- 
tained a sort of chronology of the culture of the laurel 
in Judea, in Greece, in Italy, in Africa and in Provence. 
‘The author gave counsel to those who had laurel trees 
in their gardens, indicating the multiple usage of the 
laurel, as a food, in art, in poetry, and its rdle as a 
symbol of poetic glory. He then began to talk of 
mythology, making allusions to Apollo and the fable 
of Daphné. Finally, Horace Tograth changed his tone 
brusquely and concluded his article as follows: 

“And furthermore, I say candidly, this useless tree 
is still too common, and we have less glorious sym- 
bolisms to which people attribute the famous savour 
of the laurel. “The laurel holds too large a place upon 
our overpopulated earth, the laurels are unworthy of 
living. Each one of them takes the place of two in 
the sun. Let them be chopped down, and let their 
leaves be feared asa poison. Hitherto symbols of poetry 
and literary science, they are nothing more today than 
that death-glory which is to glory as death is to life, 
and as the hand of glory is to the key. 

“True glory has abandoned poetry for science, 
philosophy, acrobatics, philanthropy, sociology, etc. 
. . . Poets are good for nothing more nowadays than 

[132] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


to receive money which they do not earn, since they 
scarcely ever work and most of them (except for the 
minstrels) have no talent and no excuse whatsoever. 
As to those who have some gifts, they are even more 
obnoxious, for if they receive nothing they make more 
noise than a regiment and din our ears with their being 
persecuted. None of these people have any raison 
détre. [he prizes which are awarded them are stolen 
from workers, inventors, scientists, philosophers, acro- 
bats, philanthropists, sociologists, and so forth. ‘The 
poets must disappear. Lycurgus would have banished 
them from the Republic, we too must banish them. 
Otherwise, the poets, lazy fiefs, will become our princes 
and while doing nothing, live off our work, oppressing 
us, and mocking us. In short, we must rid ourselves 
immediately of the poets’ tyranny. 

“If the republics and the kings, if the nations do 
not take care, the race of poets, too privileged, will 
increase in such proportions and so rapidly that in a 
short time no one will want to work, invent, teach, 
do dangerous feats, heal the sick and improve the lot 
of unfortunate men.” 

_ An enormous stir greeted this article. It was tele- 
graphed or telephoned everywhere, all the newspapers 
reproduced it. A few literary journals followed their 
quotations from Tograth’s article with mocking reflec- 
tions as to the scientist; there were doubts as to his 
mental state. They laughed at the terror which he 

[ 133 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


manifested over the lyric laurel. However, the journals 
of commerce and information made great ado about his 
warnings. ‘They even said that the article in La Voix 
was a work of genius. 

The article by Horace Tograth had been a singular 
pretext, admirably fitted to fan the blaze of hatred for 
poetry. It made its appeal through the traditional 
sense of the supernatural, whose memory lies in all 
well born men, and to the instinct for preservation 
which all beings feel. “That was why nearly all 
‘Tograth’s readers were thunderstruck, aghast, and 
wanted to lose no occasion to obliterate poets, who, 
because of the great numbers of prizes they received, 
were the subjects of the jealousy of all classes of the 
population. ‘The majority of the newspapers advo- 
cated that the government take measures leading to 
the prohibition of all poetry prizes. 

In the evening, in a later edition of La Voix, the 
agricultural chemist, Horace Tograth, published a new 
article, which, like the other, telephoned or telegraphed 
everywhere, carried popular emotion to a climax in the 
press, among the public and the governments. The 
scientist concluded as follows: 

“World, choose between thy life and poetry; if 
serious measures are not taken, civilization is done for. 
‘Thou must not hesitate. From tomorrow on begins 
the new era. Poetry will exist no longer, the lyres 

[ 134 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


too heavy for old inspirations will be broken. ‘The 
poets will be massacred.”’ 


> *K K 


During the night, life went on just as usual in all 
the cities of the globe. ‘The article, telegraphed every- 
where, had been published in the special editions of 
the local newspapers and snatched up by the hungry 
public. ‘The people all sided with Tograth. Ring- 
leaders descended into the streets and, mingling with 
the aroused mobs, excited them further. But most 
governments held sittings that very night and passed 
legislation which provoked an indescribable enthu- 
siasm. France, Italy, Spain and Portugal decreed that 
all poets established on their territory should be im- 
prisoned at once pending the determination of their lot. 

Foreign poets who were absent and sought to re- 
enter the country risked being condemned to death. It 
was cabled that the United States of America had de- 
cided to electrocute any man who avowed his profes- 
sion to be that of poetry. 

It was telegraphed that in Germany also a 
decree had been passed ordering all poets in verse or 
prose found on the imperial territory to be incarcerated 
until further orders. In fact, all of the States on earth, 
even those who possessed nothing but meager little 
bards lacking in all lyricism took measures against the 
very name of poetry. Only England and Russia were 

[ 135 } 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


exceptions. The laws went into effect at once. All 
poets who were found on French, Italian, Spanish 
and Portuguese territory were arrested on the follow- 
ing day, while the literary magazines appeared all 
garbed in black, lamenting the new terror. Dispatches 
toward noon told how Aristenetius Southwest, the 
great Negro poet of Haiti, had been cut into pieces and 
devoured by an infuriated populace of negroes and 
mulattoes. At Cologne, the Kaiserglocke had sounded 
all night and in the morning Herr Professor Doktor 
Stimmung, author of a medieval epic in forty-eight 
cantos, having gone out to take the train for Hanover, 
was set upon by a troop of fanatics who beat him with 
sticks, crying: “Death to the poet!” 

He took refuge in the cathedral and remained cleats 
in there with a few beadles, by the excited population 
of Drikkes, Hanses, and Marizibills. These last par- 
ticularly, were beside themselves with rage, invoking 
the Virgin, Saint Ursula and the Three Royal Magi 
in platdeutsch. ‘Their paternosters and pious oaths 
were interspersed with admirably vile insults to the 
professor-poet, who owed his reputation chiefly to the 
unisexuality of his morals. His head to the ground, 
he was nearly dying of fear under the big wooden statue’ 
of Saint Christopher. He heard the sounds of masons’ 
walling up all the gates of the cathedral and resigned 
himself to die of hunger. | 

Toward two o'clock it was telegraphed that a sex- 

[ 136 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


ton poet of Naples had seen the blood of Saint January 
boil up in the holy phial. The sacristan had gone 
out to proclaim the miracle and had hastened to the 
harbor front to play buck-buck. He won all that he 
desired at this game and a knife thrust in the breast 
to the bargain. 

Telegrams everywhere announced the arrests of 
poets, one after another, and the electrocution of the 
American poets was made known early in the after- 
noon. 

In Paris, several young poets of the left bank, who 
had been spared on account of their lack of notoriety, 
organized a demonstration extending from the Closerie 
des Lilas to the Conctergerie, where the ‘‘prince of 
poets’ was imprisoned. 

‘Troops arrived to disperse the demonstrators. “The 
cavalry charged. ‘The poets drew their firearms and 
defended themselves but the people rushed in and took 
a hand in the mélée. The poets were strangled and so 
was everyone else who came to their defense. 

Thus began the great persecution which swept 
rapidly throughout the entire world. In America, after 
the electrocution of the famous poets, they lynched all 
the negro minstrels and even many persons who had 
never in their lives written a rhyme; then they fell 
upon the whites of literary Bohemia. It was learned 
that Tograth, after having personally directed the 
persecution in Australia, had embarked at Melbourne. 

[ 137 ] 





ESSE 
23 








AVI 
ASSASSINATION 


IKE Orpheus, all the poets felt violent death star- 
ing them in the face. Everywhere, publishers 

had been pillaged and collections of verse burnt. ‘he 
admiration of all went out to Horace Tograth who, 
from far off Adelaide (Australia), had succeeded 
in unloosing this storm which seemed destined to de- 
stroy poetry forever. [his man’s knowledge, they 
said, bordered on the miraculous. He could drive away 
clouds or bring on rain anywhere he pleased. Women, 
once they had seen him, were ready to do his bidding. 
For the rest, he did not disdain either feminine or 
masculine virginities. As soon as Tograth had seen 
what enthusiasms he had evoked in the whole world, 
he announced that he would visit the principal cities 
of the globe, after Australia had been rid of its erotic 
and elegiac poets. And indeed some time later upris- 
ings of the population were heard of in Tokio, Pekin, 
Yakutsk, Calcutta, Buenos Ayres, San Francisco, Chi- 

[ 141 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


cago, upon the appearance of the terrible German, 
Tograth. Wherever he went, he left an unearthly im- 
pression on account of his ‘‘miracles’’ (which he called 
scientific), and his extraordinary healings, all of which 
lifted his repute as a scientist and a thaumaturgist to 
sublime heights. 

On May 30, Tograth debarked at Marseilles. 
The people were massed along the quays; Tograth 
landed from the steamer in a launch. No sooner was 
he recognized than cries, shouts, toasts, from in- 
numerable gullets mingled with the sound of the wind, 
the waves and the sirens of the vessels. “Tograth, tall 
and thin, was standing up in the launch. As it ap- 
proached the land, the features of the hero could be 
distinguished more and more clearly. His face was 
smooth-shaven and blue, his mouth almost lipless, dis- 
figured by an ugly cut; he had a receding chin which 
gave him the appearance, one might have said, of a 
shark. His brow rose straight up, very high and very 
large. “[Lograth was dressed in a pasty white costume, © 
his shoes also being white and high-heeled. He wore 
no hat. As soon as he placed his foot upon the soil 
of Marseilles the furor of the crowd rose to such heights 
that when the quays were cleared three hundred people 
were found dead, strangled, trampled, crushed. Several 
men seized the hero and raised him upon their shoulders 
while they sang and shouted, and women threw flowers 
at him all the way to the hotel where a suite had been 

[ 142] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


prepared for him and managers, interpreters and bell- 
boys were waiting to greet him. 


*K *K ok 


On the same morning, Croniamantal coming from 
Briinn had arrived at Marseilles to look for Tristouse 
who had been there since the evening before with 
Paponat. All three mingled in the crowd which 
acclaimed ‘Tograth before the hotel where he was to 
stop. 

“Happy tumult,’’ said Tristouse, ““You are not a 
poet, Paponat, you have learned things which are 
worth infinitely more than poetry. Is it not true, 
Paponat, that you are in no way a poet?” 

“Indeed, my dear,’ replied Paponat, “I have 
rhymed at times in order to amuse myself, but I am 
not a poet, I am an excellent business man and no one 
knows better than I how to manage an estate.” 

“Tonight you must mail a letter to La Voix of 
Adelaide; you must tell them all that, and so you will 
be safe.”’ 

“T shall not fail to do that,’’ said Paponat. ‘‘Did 
you ever hear of such a thing, a poet! “That goes for 
Croniamantal.”’ 

“T hope to God,”’ said Tristouse, “‘that they will 
massacre him in Briinn where he expects to find us.”’ 

“But there he is right now,’’ whispered Paponat. 
“He is in the crowd. He is hiding himself and hasn’t 
seen us.” 


, 


[ 143 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“T wish they would hurry up and massacre him,”’ 
sighed Tristouse. “‘I have an idea that that will hap- 
pen soon.”’ 


“‘Look,’”’ exclaimed Paponat, “‘here comes the 


hero.’’ 
2 K * 


The cortége which accompanied Tograth arrived 
at the hotel, and he was permitted to descend from 
their shoulders. ‘“Tograth turned to the crowd and 
addressed them: 


“Citizens of Marseilles, in thanking you I could 
employ, if | wished, compliments that are fatter than 
your world-renowned sardines. I could, if I wished, 
make a long speech. But words will never quite en- 
compass the magnificence of the reception which you 
have accorded me. I know that there are maladies in 
your midst that I might heal not only with my knowl- 
edge but with that which scientists have accumulated 
for myriads of years. Bring forth the sick, and I shall 
heal them.” 

A man whose cranium was as bald as that of an 
inhabitant of Mycona cried: 

“Tograth! god-like mortal, all puissant savan- 
tisstmo! Give mea luxuriant mane of hair.” 

Tograth smiled and asked that the man approach 
him; then he touched the denuded head, saying: 


“Thy sterile pate shall be covered with an abun- 
[144] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


dant vegetation, but remember always this favor by 
hating the laurel.’’ 

At the same time as the bald man, a little girl ap- 
proached. She implored Tograth: 

“Sweet man, sweet man, look at my mouth, my 
lover with a blow of his fist has broken several teeth. 
Return them to me.”’ 

The scientist smiled and put his finger into her 
mouth, saying: ‘‘Now thou canst chew, thou hast 
excellent teeth. But in return, show us what thou 
hast in thy bag.”’ 

The girl laughed, opening her mouth in which the 
new teeth gleamed; then she opened her bag, excusing 
herself: 

“What a funny idea, before everybody! Here are 
my keys, here an enamelled photograph of my lover; 
he really looks better than that.” 

But the eyes of Tograth were greedy; he had per- 
ceived all folded up in her bag several Parisian songs, 
rhymed and set to Viennese airs. He took these papers 
and after having scrutinized them, asked: 

“These are nothing but songs, hast thou no 
poems?”’ 

“T have a very lovely one,”’ said the girl. ‘“‘It was 
the bell-boy of the Hotel Victoria wrote it for me 
before he left for Switzerland. But I never showed it 
to Sossi.”’ 

And she proffered Tograth a little rose sheet of 

[145] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


paper on which was written a pathetic acrostic. 


< y dear beloved, ere I go away, 
nd thy love, Maria, I betray, 
tg al and sob, my sweet, once more—again, 
—«f you'd come with me to the woods, we twain,(!) 
> [l would be sweeter; our parting would not pain. 


A 


“It is not only poetry,’ 
is idiotic.”’ 

And he tore up the paper and threw it into the 
ditch, while the girl knocked her teeth in fright and 
cried: 

“Sweet man, good man, | did not know that it was 


bad.”’ 


exclaimed Tograth, “‘it 


Just then Croniamantal advanced close to Tograth 
and apostrophized the crowd: 

“Carrion, assassins!”’ 

They burst into laughter. ‘They yelled: 

“Into the water with him, the rat.”’ 

And Tograth, looking Croniamantal in the face, 
said: 

“My good brother, let not my affluence disturb 
you. As for me, I love the people, even though I stop 
at hotels which they do not frequent.” 

The poet let Tograth talk, then he continued to 
address the crowd: 

“Carrion, laugh at me, your joys are numbered, 

[ 146 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


each one of them will be torn from you one by one. 
And do you know, o people, what your hero is?”’ 
‘Tograth smiled and the crowd became all attention. 
‘The poet continued: | 
“Your hero, o populace, is Boredom bringing 
Misery.” 


A cry of astonishment issued from all the throats. 
Women crossed themselves. Yograth wanted to speak, 
but Croniamantal seized him suddenly by the neck, 
threw him to the ground and held him there with his 
foot on the man’s chest, while he spoke: 

““He is Boredom and Misery, the monstrous enemy 
of man, the Behemoth glutted with debauchery and 
rape, dripping the blood of marvellous poets. He is 
the vomit of the Antipodes, and his miracles deceive 
the clairvoyant no more than the miracles of Simon the 
Magi did the Apostles. Marseillais, Marseillais, woe 
that you whose ancestors come from the most purely 
lyrical land, should unite with the enemies of poetry, 
with the barbarians of all the nations. What a strange 
miracle, this, of the German returned from Australia! 
To have imposed it upon the world and to have been 
for a moment stronger than creation itself, stronger 
than immortal poetry.”’ 

But Tograth who was able to extricate himself at 
last, arose, soiled with dust and drunk with rage. He 
asked: 

[147] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“Who are you?” 
‘“‘Who are you, who are you?”’ cried the crowd. 


The poet turned toward the east and in exalted 
tones said: 

“IT am Croniamantal, the greatest of living poets. 
I have often seen God face to face, I have borne the 
divine rapture which my human eyes tempered. I was 
born in eternity. But the day has come, and I am 
here before you.” 


Tograth greeted these last words with a terrible 
burst of laughter, and the first ranks of the crowd 
seeing Tograth laugh, took up his laughter, which, 
in bursts, in rolls, in trills, was soon communicated 
throughout the entire populace, even to Paponat and 
‘Tristouse Ballerinette. All of the open mouths yawned 
at Croniamantal, who became ill at ease. Interspersed 
with the laughter were shouts of: 

“Into the water with the poet! ... Burn him, 
Croniamantal! . . . To the dogs with him, lover of 
the laurel!’’ 

A man who was in the first ranks and carried a 
heavy club gave Croniamantal a blow, causing him to 
make a painful grimace which doubled the merriment 
of the crowd. A stone, accurately thrown, struck the 
nose of the poet and drew blood. A fish merchant 

[ 148 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


forced his way through the mob and, confronting 
Croniamantal, said: 

“Hou! the raven. I remember you, all right, you're 
a policeman who wanted to pass for a poet; there, cow; 
take that, story teller.”’ 

And he gave him a terrific slap, spitting in his face. 
The man whom Tograth had cured of alopecia came 
to him and said: 

“Look at my hair, is it a false miracle or not?”’ 

And lifting his cane, he thrust it so adroitly that 
he gouged out Croniamantal’s right eye. Croniamantal 
fell over backward, women threw themselves upon him 
and beat him. ‘Tristouse jumped up and down with 
joy, while Paponat tried to calm her. But she went 
over and with the end of her umbrella stuck out 
Croniamantal’s other eye, while he, seeing her in this 
last moment of sight, cried: 

“I confess my love for Tristouse Ballerinette, the 
divine poesy that consoles my soul.”’ 

“Shut up, vermin!”’ cried the crowd of men, “‘there 
are ladies here.”’ 

The women went away soon, and a man who was 
balancing a large knife on his open hand threw it in 
such a way that it landed right in the open mouth of 
Croniamantal. Other men did the same thing. The 
knives stuck in his belly, his chest, and soon there was 
nothing more on the ground than a corpse bristling 
with points like the husk of a chestnut. 

[ 149 ] 


AVI 
APOTHEOSIS 


RONIAMANTAL dead, Paponat brought Tris- 
touse Ballerinette back to the hotel, where she 
relapsed into nervous fainting-spells. “Chey were in 
a very old building and by chance Paponat discovered, 
wrapped up in cardboard, a bottle of water of the 
Queen of Hungary which dated from the 17th Cen- 
tury. [his remedy worked rapidly. ‘Tristouse re- 
covered her senses and immediately went to the hospital 
to claim the body of Croniamantal which was turned 
over to her without delay. 
She arranged a decent burial for him and placed 
over his tomb a stone on which thers was engraved 
the following epitaph: 


Walk lightly and your silence keep, 
To leave untroubled his good sleep. 
[ 150 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


‘Then she went back to Paris with Paponat who 
soon left her for a mannekin of the Champs-Elysées. 

Tristouse did not regret him very long. She went 
into mourning for Croniamantal and climbed up to 
the Montmartre, to the Bird of Benin’s who began to 
pay court to her, and after he had what he Bie they 
began to talk of Croniamantal. 

“T ought to make a statue to him,”’ said the Bird 

of Benin, “‘For I am not only a painter but also a 
sculptor.”’ 

““That’s right,’’ said Tristouse, ‘‘we must raise a 
statue to him.” 

““Where?’’ asked the Bird of Benin; ‘““The govern- 
ment will not grant us any ground. ‘Times are bad 
for poets.”’ 

“So they say,’ replied Tristouse, ‘“‘but perhaps it 
isn’t true. What do you think of the Meudon woods?”’ 

“T thought of that, but I dared not say it. Let’s go 
to the Meudon woods.”’ 

“A statue of what?’’ asked Tristouse, “Marble? 
Bronze?”’ 

“No, that’s old fashioned. JI must model a pro- 
found statue out of nothing, like poetry and glory.”’ 

“Bravo! Bravo!” cried Tristouse clapping her 
hands, ‘‘A statue out of nothing, empty, that’s lovely, 
and when will you make it?”’ 

“Tomorrow, if you wish; we shall go and dine, 
pass the night together, and in the morning we shall 

[151] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


go to the Meudon woods where I shall make this pro- 
found statue.’ 
*k * x 

No sooner said, than done. They went and dined 
with the élite of the Montmartre, returned to sleep at 
midnight and on the next morning at nine o'clock, 
after having armed himself with a pick-axe, a spade, 
a shovel and some boasting-chisels, they took the road 
for the pretty Meudon woods, where they met the 
Prince of Poets, accompanied by his little friend, quite 
happy over the pleasant days he had spent in the City- 
prison. 

In the clearing, the Bird of Benin set to work. In 
a few hours he had dug a trench of about a meter and 
a half in breadth and two in depth. 

‘Then they had lunch on the grass. 

The afternoon was devoted by the Bird of Benin 
to sculpturing the interior of the monument to Cronia- 
mantal. 

On the following day, the sculptor came back with 
workingmen who fixed up an armed cement wall, six 
inches broad on top, and eighteen inches broad at the 
base, so that the empty space had the form of Cronia- 
mantal, and the hole was full of his specter. 

* * * | 

On the next day, the Bird of Benin, Tristouse, the 
Prince of Poets and his little friend came back to the 
statue which was heaped up with earth which they 

[ 152 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


had gathered here and there, and at nightfall they 
planted a fine laurel tree, while Tristouse Ballerinette 


danced and sang: 


No one loves thee thou art lying 
Palantila Mila Mima 

When he was lover to the queen 

He was king while she was queen 


’T1s true, ‘tis true that I love him 

Croniamantal way down tn the pit 
Can that be right 

Let us gather the sweet marjoram 
At night. 


“THE END 


4a] 





se, 





NOTES 


1‘The French language at the end of the nineteenth 
century had reached a certain fixation, chiefly through the in- 
fluence of Mallarmé, whose literary artifice was consternating. 
Apollinaire, a bizarre scholar, and yet a “‘lord of language,’’ was 
more of a freebooter. Many of his exoticisms came from the 
market-place or from other tongues. Their sources were fair 
and false. But at bottom, there is the sincere desire to free 
modern literature from romantic sentiment, and artifice, to use 
words as directly and freely as in conversation. 


2 Here Apollinaire’s frivolous playing with the language 
can scarcely be rendered. “The original runs: “. . en me 
réfugiant dans mon ou ma ‘bedroom’ du ou de la ‘family house’ 


ou j étais descendue.”’ 


§'Wilhelm de Kostrowitzki was baptized in Rome, 
September 29, 1880, at the Sacrosancta Patriarcalis Basilica 
Santa Mariae Maioris. His father is said to have been a high 
prelate of the Catholic Church. 


4 “Let the seven countries and four continents dispute the 
honor of his birthplace’’—Mme. de Kostrowitzka (who had 
never opened but one of his books, and found that “‘idiotic’’) 
exclaimed one day: 


“O Poland, thou wilt remember thy great son!”’ 
[185] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


5 Apollinaire wrote to his friend André Billy: “Was I not 
too a master of rhymed verse?’’ This brief couplet, paraphrased 


from 
Luth! 
Zut! 


marked a point of departure toward Calligrammes. 


6 This ‘‘absolute’’ poem, “freed from the restrictions of 
even language’ may be profitably studied for its positive sug- 
gestions. The Dadaists, whose godfather Apollinaire was, 
took up this form with a passionate conviction that terrified 
the populace after the war. “Is not every art-theory, every 
school, only the triumph of an individual’s taste, the imposi- 
tion of a stronger mind upon the weaker ones?’’ Nonsense- 
poems, were the reductio ad absurdum of all literary artifice. 
The final word, the ultimate bankruptcy. Apollinaire’s intense 
desire to negate literary precedent and to innovate, led through 
the stimulus of the Cubist painters to Calligrammes, which con- 
tains his calligraphic poetry. “he typography is arranged most 
intricately, with regard to its pictural or abstract effect. Apol- 
linaire hoped utimately to unite poetry and painting, in fact 
his last critical writings in the Mercure de France are filled with 
amazing conjectures as to the future of art. 


The “‘poémes conversations’ of Calligrammes, as André 
Billy relates, may well have originated in the following manner: 

“He, Dupuy, and IJ are sitting at Crucifixe with three glasses 
of vermouth. Suddenly Guillaume bursts out laughing—he 
has completely forgotten to write the preface to Robert Delau- 
nay’s catalogue, which he promised to mail that evening. 
‘Quick waiter, pen and ink. Three of us will get through with 
this in a jiffy.’ Guillaume’s pen is off already: 


‘Of red and green all the yellow dies.’ 
His pen stops. 
But Dupuy dictates: 
“When the arras sing in our natal forests.’ 
The pen starts off again transcribing faithfully. 
It is my turn: 

[ 156 ] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


“There is a poem to be written about the bird with but one 
wing.’ 

A reminiscence from Alcools—the pen writes without a 
stop. , 
‘A good thing to do if there is any hurry,’ I said, ‘would 
be to send your preface over the telephone.’ 

And so the next line became: 

‘And we shall send this by the telephone.’ 

I no longer remember all the details of this singular collab- 
oration, but I can state that the preface to the catalogue of 
Robert Delaunay came out entire.”’ 


7’This chapter is obviously written in an entirely differ- 
ent period. “The Poet Assassinated, composes, if we choose to 
believe so, Apollinaire’s vision of his own life. The book was 
collated from many fragments, many beginnings, and published 
in 1916, by ‘“V’Edition,’’ for the so-called ‘“‘Librairie des 
Curieux.’’ In the opening passage of this chapter part of the 
influences of the Cubist painters, and their inventions are par- 
ticularly apparent. 


8 The theatre in France of the period immediately pre- 
ceding the war is a sorry thing to relate. We will pass over 
Brieux, Hervieu, Battaille, Bernstein, to consider Donnay, 
Porto-Riche and their ilk. These worthies and their imitators 
achieved unparalleled financial and social triumphs by incorpo- 
rating a certain intimate lewdness into their trivial drama. 
Their obvious theatrical machinery, which Apollinaire ridicules, 
has been as successfully adopted in this country and elsewhere in 
Europe, under the label of ‘“‘modern drama.” 


9 Mamamouchi is a character in Moliére’s play, le Bour- 
geois Gentilhomme, a dignitary whose sense of office is so 
strongly inbedded in him that he always enters shouting, “Je 
suis Mamamouchi!”’ ; 


10 Francois Coppée, this sentimental nineteenth century 
poet was amazingly popular, and truly French in his weak- 


[ 157] 


THE POET ASSASSINATED 


nesses, like the music of Massenet. Apollinaire takes grave lib- 
erties with him, out of sheer mischief. 


11 Archipel, archipelago, used in the sense of papier buvard 
(!) blotting paper! The disciples of Mallarmé went even 
farther than this. 


12 Tychobrahé, Tycho Brahe, the Danish astronomer 
(1546-1601). Although lord of a province in Scania, he took 
refuge in a monastery where he pursued his scientific researches. 


He settled in Prague, at the invitation of Emperor Rudolf II, 
and died there. Whether he ever really visited the monastery 
at Brinn is hard to judge. 


13 "The number of prizes given for poetry and for other 
forms of literature has reached an even more disquieting figure 
since the war. Great publicity attends each award, and the 
publishers vie with each other in establishing such prizes. How- 
ever, the lot of the true poet is as hard as ever, since it has be- 
come distinctly unfashionable to be the recipient of a prize. 


14Paul Fort, Prince of Poets, he, of the broad-brimmed 
black hat, and the flowing scarf, frequented the Closérie des 
Lilas, with his band, whereas his avowed enemy, Apollinaire, 
and his far more disreputable cronies quartered themselves in 
the Café Rotonde, a short distance east along the Boulevard 
Montparnasse. 


[ 158 ] 














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